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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 




ANDREW MURRAY 




OLY IN CHRIST 



THOUGHTS ON THE CALLING 
OF GOD'S CHILDREN TO BE 
HOLY AS HE IS HOLY ^ ^ ^ 



/ 



By the REV. ANDREW PJRRAY 

Author of ** Abide in Christ," ''Like Christ/' and ^ 
"With Christ" ^^^^jK^^^^^^Jt 



"I AM HOLY: 
YE SHALL BE HOLY** 












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Philadelphia!^ ^ ^ ^ ^ 

HENRY ALTEMUS 



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Copyrighted, 1896, by Henry Altemus. 



HENRY ALTEMUS, MANUFACTURER, 
PHILADELPHIA. 



PREFACE. 

THERE is not in Scripture a word more distinctly 
Divine in its origin and mieaning than the 
word holy. There is not a word that leads us 
higher into the mystery of Deity, nor deeper into 
the privilege and the blessedness of God's children. 
And yet it is a word that many a Christian has 
never studied or understood. 

There are not a few who can praise God that 
during the past twenty years the watchword Be 
Holy has been taken up in many a church and 
Christian circle with greater earnestness than be- 
fore. In books and magazines, in conventions 
and conferences, in the testimonies and the lives 
of believers, we have abundant tokens that what is 
called the Holiness-movement is a reality. 

And yet how much is still wanting! What 
multitudes of believing Christians there are who 
have none but the very vaguest thoughts of what 
holiness is! And of those who are seeking after it 
how many who have hardly learnt what it is to 
come to God's Word and to God Himself for the 
teaching that can alone reveal this part of the 
mystery of Christ and of God ! To many, holiness 
has simply been a general expression for the 

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6 PREFACE, 

Christian life in its more earnest form, without 
much thought of what the term reallj^ means. 

In writing this little book, my object has been to 
discover in what sense God uses the word, that so 
it may mean to us what it means to Him. I have 
sought to trace the word through some of the most 
important passages of Holy Scripture where it 
occurs, there to learn what God's holiness is, what 
ours is to be, and what the way by which we attain 
it. I have been specially anxious to point out how 
many and various the elements are that go to make 
up true holiness as the Divine expression of the 
Christian life in all its fulness and perfection. I 
have at the same time striven continually to keep 
in mind the wonderful unity and simplicity there 
is in it, as centred in the person of Jesus. As I 
proceeded in my work, I felt ever more deeply how 
high the task was I had undertaken in offering to 
guide others even into the outer courts of the Holy 
Place of the Most High. And yet the very difficulty 
of the task convinced me of how needful it was. 

I fear there are some to whom the book may 
be a disappointment. They have heard that the 
entrance to the life of holiness is often but a step. 
They have heard of or seen believers who could 
tell of the blessed change that has come over their 
lives since they found the wonderful secret of 
holiness by faith. And now they are seeking for 



PREFACE. 7 

this secret. They cannot understand that the 
secret comes to those who seek it not, but only seek 
Jesus. They might fain have a book in which all 
they need to know of Holiness and the way to it is 
gathered into a few simple lessons, easy to learn, to 
remember, and to practise. This they will not find. 
There is such a thing as a Pentecost still to the 
disciples of Jesus ; but it comes to him who has 
forsaken all to follow Jesus only, and in following 
fully has allowed the Master to reprove and instruct 
him. There are often very blessed revelations of 
Christ, as a Saviour from sin, both in the secret 
chamber and in the meetings of the saints ; but 
these are given to those for whom they have been 
prepared, and who have been prepared to receive. 
Let all learn to trust in Jesus, and rejoice in Him, 
even though their experience be not what they 
would wish. He will make us holy. But whether 
we have entered the blessed life of faith in Jesus 
as our sanctification, or are still longing for it from 
afar, we all need one thing, the simple, believing, 
and obedient acceptance of each word that our God 
has spoken. It has been my earnest desire that I 
might be a helper of the faith of my brethren in 
seeking to trace with them the wondrous revelation 
of God's Holiness through the ages as recorded in 
His blessed Word. It has been my continual 
prayer that God might use what is written to 



8 PBEFACE. 

increase in His children the conviction that we 
must be holy, the knowledge of how we are to be 
holy, the joy that we may be holy, the faith that 
we can be holy. And may He stir us all to cry 
day and night to Him for a visitation of the Spirit 
and the Power of Holiness upon all His people, 
that the name of Christian and of saint may be 
synonymous, and every believer be a vessel made 
holy and meet for the Master's use. 

A. M. 



OOKTENTS. 



DAY PAGE 

1. God's Call to Holiness— 1 Pet. i. 15, 16 11 

2. God's Provision for Holiness — 1 Cor. i. 2 20 

3. Holiness and Creation — Gen. ii. 3 30 

4. Holiness and Revelation — Ex. iii. 4-6 39 

5* Holiness and Redemption — Ex. xiii. 2 61 

6. Holiness and Glory— Ex. xv. 11-17 61 

7. Holiness and Obedience — Ex. xix. 5,6 71 

8. Holiness and Indwelling — Ex. xxv. 8 82 

9. Holiness and Mediation — Ex. xxviii. 36-38 92 

10. Holiness and Separation — Lev. xx. 24, 26 101 

11. The Holy One of Israel— Lev. xi. 45 112 

12. The Thrice Holy One— Isa. vi. 1-3 123 

13. Holiness and Humility — Isa. Ivii. 15 134 

14. The Holy One of God— John vi. 69 144 

15. The Holy Spirit— John vii. 39 153 

16. Holiness and Truth — John xvii. 17 163 

17. Holiness and Crucifixion — John xvii. 19 173 

18. Holiness and Faith — Acts xxvi. 18 183 

19. Holiness and Resurrection — Rom. i. 4 194 

20. Holiness and Liberty— Rom. vi. 18-22 204 

21. Holiness and Happiness — Rom. xiv. 17 214 

22. In Christ our Sanctification— 1 Cor. i. 30,31 225 

23. Holiness and the Body— 1 Cor. iii. 16 235 

24. Holiness and Cleansing — 2 Cor. vii. 1 246 

25. Holiness and Blamelessness — 1 Thess. iii. 12, 13 256 

26. Holiness and the Will of God— 1 Thess. iv. 3 266 

27. Holiness and Service— 2 Tim. ii. 21 276 

28. The Way into the Holiest— Heb. x. 19 286 

29. Holiness and Chastisement — Heb. xii. 10,14 298 

30. The Unction from the Holy One— 1 John ii. 20, 27 309 

31. Holiness and Heaven— 2 Pet. iii. 11 319 

Notes 331 

(9) 



FIRST DAY. 



HOLY IN CHRIST. 
(BoO'0 Call to 1bollne00» 

"Like as He which called you is holyy be ye yourselves also 
holy in all manner of living ; because it is written, Ye shall be 
holy, for I am holy:'— I Pet. i. 15, 16. 

THE call of God is the manifestation in time of 
the purpose of eternity : " Whom He predes- 
tinated, them He also called'^ Believers are '' the 
called according to His purpose." In His call He 
reveals to us what His thoughts and His will con- 
cerning us are, and what the life to which He 
invites us. In His call He makes clear to us 
what the hope of our calling is; as we spiritually 
apprehend and enter into this, our life on earth 
will be the reflection of His purpose in eternity. 

Holy Scripture uses more than one word to 
indicate the object or aim of our calling, but none 
more frequently than what Peter speaks of here — 
God has called us to be holy as He is holy. Paul 
addresses believers twice as ** called to be Aoii/." 
Rom, i. 7 ; 1 Cor. i. 2. " God called us," he says, " not 

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12 HOLY m CHRIST, 

for uncleanness, but in sanctificationy 1 Thess. iv. 7. 
When he writes, " The God of peace sanctify you 
wholly," he adds, " Faithful is He which calleth 
you, who also will do it." 1 Thess, v. 24. The call- 
ing itself is spoken of as '^ a holy calling." The 
eternal purpose of which the calling is the out- 
come, is continually also connected with holiness 
as its aim. ^' He hath chosen us in Him, that we 
should be holy and without blame." Eph, i. 4. 
" Whom God chose from the beginning unto salva- 
tion in sanctijication.^^ 2 Thess, ii. 12. " Elect accord- 
ing to the foreknowledge of the Father, through 
sanctification of the Spirit." 1 Pet. i. 2. The call is 
the unveiling of the purpose that the Father from 
eternity had set His heart upon : that we should 
be holy. 

It needs no proof that it is of infinite impor- 
tance to know aright what God has called us to. 
A misunderstanding here may have fatal results. 
You may have heard that God calls you to salva- 
tion or to happiness, to receive pardon or to obtain 
heaven, and never noticed that all these were sub- 
ordinate. It was to " salvation in sanctification,^^ it 
was to Holiness in the first place, as the element 
in which salvation and heaven are to be found. 
The complaints of many Christians as to lack of 
joy and strength, as to failure and want of growth, 
are simply owing to this — the place God gave 



GOD'S CALL TO HOLINESS. 13 

Holiness in His call they have not given it in their 
response. God and they have never yet come to 
an agreement on this. 

No wonder that Paul, in the chapter in which 
be had spoken to the Ephesians of their being 
^' chosen to be holy/' prays for the spirit of wisdom 
and revelation in the knowledge of God to be 
given to believers, that they might know " the 
hope of their callingy i. 17, 18. Let all of us, who 
feel that we have too little realized that we are 
called to Holiness, pray this prayer. It is just 
what we need. Let us ask God to show us how, 
as He who hath called us is Himself holy, so we 
are to be holy too ; our calling is a holy calling, a 
calling before and above everything, to Holiness. 
Let us ask Him to show us what Holiness is. His 
Holiness first, and then our Holiness ; to show us 
how He has set His heart upon it as the one thing 
He wants to see in us, as being His own image 
and likeness; to show us too the unutterable 
blessedness and glory of sharing with Christ in 
His Holiness. Oh ! that God by His Spirit would 
teach us what it means that we are called to be 
holy as He is holy. We can easily conceive what 
a mighty influence it would exert. 

" Like as He which called you is holy, be ye 
yourselves also holy." How this call of God 
shows us the true motive to Holiness. '^ Be ye 



14 HOLY IN CHRIST. 

holy, for I am holy." It is as if God said, Holiness 
is my blessedness and m}'- glory : without this you 
cannot, in the very nature of things, see me or en- 
joy me. Holiness is my blessedness and my glory : 
there is nothing higher to be conceived ; I invite 
you to share with me in it, I invite you to likeness 
to myself: " Be ye holy, for I am holy." Is it not 
enough, has it no attraction, does it not move and 
draw you mightily, the hope of being with me, 
partakers of my Holiness ? I have nothing better 
to offer — I offer you myself: "Be holy, for I am 
holy." Shall we not cry earnestly to God to show 
us the glory of His Holiness, that our souls may be 
made willing to give everything in response to this 
wondrous call ? 

As we listen to the call, it shows also the nature 
of true Holiness. ^''Like as He is holy, so be ye also 
holy." To be holy is to be Godlike, to have a dis- 
position, a will, a character like God. The thought 
almost looks like blasphemy, until we listen again, 
"He hath chosen us in Christ to be holy." In 
Christ the Holiness of God. appeared in a human 
life : in Christ's example, in His mind and Spirit, 
we have the Holiness of the Invisible One trans- 
lated into the forms of human life and conduct. 
To be Christlike is to be Godlike ; to be Christlike 
is to be holy as God is holy. 

The call equally reveals the power of Holiness. 



Q0D*8 CALL TO HOLINESS. 15 

" There is none holy but the Lord ; " there is no 
Holiness but what He has, or rather what He iSy 
and gives. Holiness is not something we do or 
attain : it is the communication of the Divine life, 
the inbreathing of the Divine nature, the power of 
the Divine Presence resting on us. And our power 
to become holy is to be found in the call of God : the 
Holy One calls us to Himself, that He may make 
us holy in possessing Himself. He not only says 
''I am holy," but "I am the Lord, who make 
holy." It is because the call to Holiness comes 
from the God of infinite Power and Love that we 
may have the confidence : we can be holy. 

The call no less reveals the standard of Holiness- 
" Like as He is holy, so ye also yourselves," or (as in 
margin, R. V.), *' Like the Holy One, which calleth 
you, be ye yourselves also holy." There is not one 
standard of Holiness for God and another for man. 
The nature of light is the same, whether we see it 
in the sun or in a candle : the nature of Holiness 
remains unchanged, whether it be God or man in 
whom it dwells. The Lord Jesus could say 
nothing less than, ^' Be perfect, eVen as your Father 
in heaven is perfect." When God calls us to Holi- 
ness, He calls us to Himself and His own life • 
the more carefully we listen to the voice, and let it 
sink into our hearts, the more will all human 



16 HOLY IJSr CHBI8T. 

standards fall away, and only the words be heard, 
Holy, as I am holy. 

And the call shows us the 'path to Holiness. 
1 The calling of God is one of mighty efficacy, an 
effectual calling. Oh ! let us but listen to it, let 
us but listen to Him, and the call will with Divine 
power work what it offers. He calleth the things 
that are not as though they were : His call gives 
life to the dead, and holiness to those whom He has 
made alive. He calls us to listen as He speaks of 
His Holiness, and of our holiness like His. He 
calls us to Himself, to study, to fear, to love, to 
claim His Holiness. He calls us to Christ, in 
whom Divine Holiness became human Holiness, 
to see and admire, to desire and accept what is all 
for us. He calls us to the indwelling and the 
teaching of the Spirit of Holiness, to yield our- 
selves that He may bring home to us and breathe 
within us what is ours in Christ. Christian ! listen 
to God calling thee to Holiness. Come and learn 
what His Holiness is, and what thine is and must 
be. 

Yes, be very silent and listen. When God 
called Abraham, he answered. Here am I. When 
God called Moses from the bush, he answered. Here 
am I, and he hid his face, for he was afraid to look 
upon God. God is calling thee to Holiness, to 
Himself the Holy One, that He may make thee 



GOD'S CALL TO HOLINESS. 17 

holy. Let thy whole soul answer, Here am I, 
Lord ! Speak, Lord ! Show Thyself, Lord ! Here 
am I. As you listen the voice will sound ever 
deeper and ever stiller: Be holy, as I am holy. Be 
holy, for 1 am holy. You will hear a voice coming 
out of the great eternity, from the council-cham- 
ber of redemption, and as you catch its distant 
whisper, it will be, Be holy, I am holy. You will 
hear a voice from Paradise, the Creator making 
the seventh day holy for man whom He had 
created, and saying. Be holy. You will hear the 
voice from Sinai, amid thunderings and lightnings^ 
and still it is. Be holy, as I am holy. You will 
hear a voice from Calvary, and there above all 
it is, Be holy, for I am holy. 

Child of God, have you ever realized it, our 
Father is calling us to Himself, to be holy as 
He is holy? Must we not confess that happiness 
has been to us more than holiness, salvation than 
sanctification ? Oh ! it is not too late to redeem 
the error. Let us now band ourselves together to 
listen to the voice that calls, to draw nigh, and find 
out and know what Holiness is, or rather, find out 
and know Himself the Holy One. And if the 
first approach to Him fill us with shame and con- 
fusion, make us fear and skrink back, let us still 
listen to the Voice and the Call, " Be holy, as I am 
holy." " Faithful is He which calleih^ who also will 
2 



18 HOLY m CHRIST. 

do 2^." All our fears and questions will be met 
by the Holy One who has revealed His Holiness, 
with this one purpose in view, that we might 
share it with Him. As we yield ourselves in deep 
stillness of soul to listen to the Holy Voice that 
calls us, it will waken within us new desire and 
strong faith, and the most precious of all promises 
will be to us this word of Divine command : 

Be holy, for I am holy. 



O Lord! the alone Holy One, Thou hast called 
us to be holy, even as Thou art holy. Lord ! how 
can we, unless Thou reveal to us Thy Holiness. 
Show us, we pray Thee, how Thou art holy, how 
holy Thou art, what Thy holiness is, that we may 
know how we are to be holy, how holy we are to 
be. And when the sight of Thy Holiness only 
shows us the more how unholy we are, teach 
us that Thou makest partakers of Thy own Holi- 
ness those who come to Thee for it. 

O God ! we come to Thee, the Holy One. It is 
in knowing and finding and having Thyself, that 
the soul finds Holiness. We do beseech Thee, as 
we now come to Thee, establish it in the thoughts 
of our hearts, that the one object of Thy calling us, 
and of our coming to Thee, is Holiness. Thou 



GOD'S CALL TO HOLINESS. 19 

wouldst have us like Thyself, partakers of Thy 
Holiness. If ever our heart becomes afraid, as if 
it were too high, or rests content with a salvation 
less than Holiness, Blessed God! let us hear Thy 
voice calling again, Be holy, I am holy. Let that 
call be our motive and our strength, because faith- 
ful is He that calleth, who also will do it. Let 
that call mark our standard and our path ; oh ! 
let our life be such as Thou art able to make it. 

Holy Father! I bow in lowly worship and 
silence before Thee. Let now Thine own voice 
sound in the depths of my heart calling me. 
Be holy, as I am holy. Amen. 

1. Let me press it upon every reader of this little book, that if 
it is to help him in the pursuit of Holiness, he must begin with 
God Himself, You must go to Him who calls you. It is only 
in the personal revelation of God to you, as He speaks, I 
am holy, that the command, Be ye holy, can have life or 
power. 

2. Remember, as a believer, you have already accepted God^s 
call, even though you did not fully understand it. Let it be a 
settled matter, that whatever you see to be the meaning of the 
call, you will at once accept and carry out. If God calls me to 
be holy, holy I wiU be. 

3. Take fast hold of the word : " The God of peace sanctify 
you wholly : faithful is He which calleth you, who also will do 
it.^^ In that faith listen to God calling you. 

4. Do be still now, and listen to your Father calling you. 
Ask for and count upon the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Holiness, 
to open your heart to understand this holy calling. And then 
speak out the answer you have to give to this call. 



20 EOLT IN CHRIST. 



SECOND DAY. 



HOLY IN CHRIST. 
6oD'0 iprovteion tor Iboltnesa* 

" To those that are made holy in Christ Jesus, called to be 
holy.^^ — 1 Cor, i. 2. 

" To all the holy ones in Christ Jesus which are at Philippi. 
Salute every holy one in Christ Jesus." ^ — Phil. i. 1, iv. 21. 

HOLY! In Christ! In these two expressions 
we have perhaps the most wonderful words 
of all the Bible. 

Holy! the word of unfathomable meaning, 

1 There is one disadvantage in English in our having synonyms 
of which some are derived from Saxon and others from Latin. 
Ordinary readers are apt to forget that in our translation of the 
Bible we may use two different words for what in the original is 
expressed by one term. This is the case with the words holy^ 
holiness, keep holy, hallow, saint, sanctify , and sanctification. 
When God or Christ is called the Holy One, the word in Hebrew 
and Greek is exactly the same that is used when the believer is 
called a saint : he too is a holy one. So the three words hallow^ 
keep holy, sanctijiy, all represent but one term in the original, 
of which the real meaning is to make holy, as it is in Dutch, 
heiliging (holying), heiligmaking (holy-making). 



GOD'S PROVISION FOB HOLINESS. 21 

which the Seraphs utter with veiled faces. Holy ! 
the word in which all God's perfections centre, and 
of which His glory is but the streaming forth. 
Holy ! the word which reveals the purpose with 
which God from eternity thought of man, and 
tells what man's highest glory in the coming 
eternity is to be ; to be partaker of His Holiness ! 

In Christ ! the word in which all the wisdom 
and love of God are unveiled ! The Father giving 
His Son to be one with us ! the Son dying on the 
cross to make us one with Himself! the Holy 
Spirit of the Father dwelling in us to establish and 
maintain that union! In Christ! what a sum- 
mary of what redemption has done, and of the 
inconceivably blessed life in which the child of 
God is permitted to dwell. In Christ ! the one 
lesson we have to study on earth. God's one an- 
swer to all our needs and prayers. In Christ ! 
the guarantee and the foretaste of eternal glory. 

What wealth of meaning and blessing in the 
two words combined : Holy in Christ ! Here is 
God's provision for our holiness, God's response to 
our question. How to be holy ? Often and often 
as we hear the call. Be ye holy, even as I am holy, 
it is as if there is and ever must be a great gulf be- 
tween the holiness of God and man. In Christ ! 
is the bridge that crosses the gulf; nay rather, His 
fulness has filled it up. In Christ ! God and man 



22 HOLY m CHRIST. 

meet ; in Christ ! the Holiness of God has fouud 
us, and made us its own ; has become human, and 
can indeed become our very own. To the anxious 
cries and the heart-yearnings of thousands of 
thirsty souls who have believed in Jesus and yet 
know not how to be holy, here is God's answer : 
Ye are Holy in Christ Jesus. Would they but 
hearken, and believe ; would they but take these 
Divine words, and say them over, if need be, a 
thousand times, how God's light w^ould shine, and 
fill their hearts with joy and love as they echo 
them back : Yes, now I see it. Holy in Christ ! 
Made hol}^ in Christ Jesus ! 

As we set ourselves to study these wondrous 
words, let us remember that it is only God Him- 
self who can reveal to us what Holiness truly is. 
Let us fear our own thoughts, and crucify our 
own wisdom. Let us give up ourselves to receive, 
in the power of the life of God Himself, working 
in us by the Holy Spirit, that which is deeper and 
truer than human thought, Christ Himself as our 
Holiness. In this dependence upon the teaching 
of the Spirit of Holiness, let us seek simply to ac- 
cept what Holy Scripture sets before us ; as the 
revelation of the Holy One of old was a very slow 
and gradual one, so let us be content patiently to 
follow step by step the path of the shining light 



GOD'S PBO VISION FOR HOLINESS. 2S 

through the Word; it will shine more and more 
unto the perfect day. 

We shall first have to study the word Holy in 
the Old Testament. In Israel as the holy people, 
the ty^e of us who now are holy in Christ, 
we shall see with what fulness of symbol God 
sought to work into the very constitution of 
the people some apprehension of what He would 
have them be. In the law we shall see how 
Holy is the great key-word of the redemption 
w^hich it was meant to serve and prepare for. In 
the prophets we shall hear how the Holiness of 
God is revealed as the source whence the coming 
redemption should spring : it is not so much Holi- 
ness as the Holy One they speak of, who would, in 
redeeming love and saving righteousness, make 
Himself known as the God of His people. 

And when the meaning of the word has beert 
somewhat opened up, and the deep need of the 
blessing made manifest in the Old Testament, we 
shall come to the New to find how that need was 
fulfilled. In Christ, the Holy One of God, Divine 
Holiness will be found in human life and human 
nature; a truly human will being made perfect 
and growing up through obedience into complete 
union with all the Holy Will of God. In the sac- 
rifice of Himself on the cross, that holy nature 
gave itself up to the death, that, like the seed-corn, 



24 HOLY IN CHRIST. 

it might through death live again and reproduce 
itself in us. In the gift from the throne of the 
Spirit of God's Holiness, representing and reveal- 
ing and communicating the unseen Christ, the 
holy life of Christ descends and takes possession of 
His people, and they become one with Him. As 
the Old Testament had no higher word than that 
Holy, the New has none deeper than this, in 
Christ. The being in Him, the abiding in Him, 
the being rooted in Him, the growing up in Him 
and into Him in all things, are the Divine expres- 
sions in which the wonderful and complete one- 
ness between us and our Saviour are brought as 
near us as human language can do. 

And when Old and New Testament have each 
given their message, the one in teaching us what 
Holy, the other what in Christ means, we have in 
the word of God, that unites the two, the most 
complete summary of the Great Redemption that 
God's love has provided. The everlasting certainty, 
the wonderful sufficiency, the infinite efficacy of 
the Holiness that God has prepared for us in His 
Son, are all revealed in this blessed, Holy in 
Christ. 

" The Holy Ones in Christ Jesus! " Such is the 
name, beloved fellow-believers, which we bear in 
Holy Scripture, in the language of the Holy Spirit. 
It is no mere statement of doctrine, that we are 



GOD'S PEG VISION FOR HOLUSTUSS. 25 

holy in Christ : it is no deep theological discussion 
to which we are invited; but out of the depths 
of God's loving heart, there comes a voice thus 
addressing His beloved children. It is the name 
by which the Father calls His children. That 
name tells us of God's provision for our being holy. 
It is the revelation of what God has given us, and 
what we already are ; of what God waits to work 
in us, and what can be ours in personal practical 
possession. That name, gratefully accepted, joy- 
fully confessed, trustfully pleaded, will be the 
pledge and the power of our attainment of the 
Holiness to which we have been called. 

And so we shall find that as we go along, all our 
study and all God's teaching will be comprised in 
three great lessons. The first a revelation, " I am 
holy ;^^ the second a command, " Be ye holy ;^^ the 
third a gift, the link between the two, " Ye are holy 
in ChrisV^ 

First comes the revelation, " I am holy." Our 
study must be on bended knee, in the spirit of 
worship and deep humility. God must reveal 
Himself to us, if we are to know what Holy is. 
The deep unholiness of our nature and all that is 
of nature must be shown us; with Moses and 
Isaiah, when the Holy One revealed Himself to 
them, we must fear and tremble, and confess how 
utterly unfit we are for the revelation or the fellow- 



26 HOLY m CHRIST. 

ship, without the cleansing of fire. In the con- 
sciousness of the utter impotence of our own 
wisdom or understanding to know God, our souls 
must in contrition, brokenness from ourselves and 
our power or efforts, yield to God's Spirit, the Spirit 
of Holiness, to reveal God as the Holy One. And 
as we begin to know Him in His infinite righteous- 
ness, in His fiery burning zeal against all that is 
sin, and His infinite self-sacrificing love to free the 
sinner from his sin, and to bring him to His own 
perfection, we shall learn to w^onder at and worship 
this glorious God, to feel and deplore our terrible 
unlikeness to Him, to long and cry for some share 
in the Divine beauty and blessedness of this 
Holiness. 

And then will come with new meaning the 
command, " Be holy, as I am holy." Oh, my 
brethren ! ye who profess to obey the commands 
of your God, do give this all-surpassing and all- 
including command that first place in your heart 
and life which it claims. Do be holy with the 
likeness of God's Holiness. Do be holy as He is 
holy. And if you find that the more you meditate 
and study, the less you can grasp this infinite 
holiness; that the more you at moments grasp of 
it, the more you despair of a holiness so Divine ; 
remember that such breaking down and such de- 
spair is just what the command was meant to 



GOD'S PROVISION FOB HOLINESS. 27 

work. Learn to cease from your own wisdom as 
well as your own goodness ; draw near in poverty 
of spirit to let the Holy One show you how utterly 
above human knowledge or human power is the 
holiness He demands ; to the soul that ceases from 
self, and has no confidence in the flesh, He will 
show and give the holiness He calls us to. 

It is to such that the great gift of Holiness 
in Christ becomes intelligible and acceptable. 
Christ brings the Holiness of God nigh by showing 
it in human conduct and intercourse. He brings 
it nigh by removing the barrier between it and us, 
between God and us. He brings it nigh, because 
He makes us one with Himself. ''Holy in 
Christ:" our holiness is a Divine bestowment, held ] 
for us, communicated to us, working mightil}^ in \ 
us because we are in Him, " In Christ ! " oh, that \ 
wonderful in! our very life rooted in the life 
of Christ. That holy Son and Servant of the 
Father, beautiful in His life of love and obedience 
on earth, sanctifying Himself for us — that life of 
Christ, the ground in which I am planted and 
rooted, the soil from which I draw as m}^ nourish- 
ment its every quality and its very nature. How 
that word sheds its light both on the revelation, 
" I am holy," and on the command, '' Be ye holy, 
as I am," and binds them in one ! In Christ I see 
what God's Holiness is, and what my holiness is. 



2S HOLY IN CHRIST. 

In Him both are one, and both are mine. In 
Him I am holy ; abiding and growing up in Him, 
I can be holy in all manner of living, as God is 
holy. 

Be ye holy, as I am holy. 



Most Holy God! we do beseech Thee, reveal 
Thou to Thy children what it meaneth that Thou 
hast not only called them to holiness, but even 
called them by this name, ^' the holy ones in 
Christ Jesus." Oh that every child of Thine 
might know that he bears this name, might know 
what it means, and what power there is in it 
to make him what it calls him. Holy Lord God! 
«oh that the time of Thy visitation might speedily 
come, and each child of Thine on earth be known 
-as a holy one ! 

To this end we pray Thee to reveal to Thy saints 
what Thy Holiness is. Teach us to worship and 
to wait until Thou hast spoken unto our souls 
with Divine Power Thy word, " I am holy." Oh 
that it may search out and convict us of our un- 
holiness ! 

And reveal to us, we pray Thee, that as holy as 
Thou art, even a consuming fire, so holy is Thy 
command in its determined and uncompromising 
purpose to have us holy. God ! let Thy voice 
;Sound through the depth of our being, with a 



GOD'S PROVISION FOR HOLINESS, 29 

power from which there is no escape : Be holy, be 
holy. 

And let us thus, between Thine infinite Holi- 
ness on the one hand and our unholiness on 
the other, be driven and be drawn to accept of 
Christ as our sanctification, to abide in Him as 
our life and our power to be what Thou wouldst 
have us — '' Holy in Christ Jesus." 

O Father! let Thy Spirit make this precious 
word life and truth within us. Amen. 

1. You are entering anew on the study of a Divine mystery. 
** Trust not to your own understanding ;'' wait for the teaching 
of the Spirit of truth. 

2. In Christ. A commentator says, " The phrase denotes two 
moral facts — first, the act of faith whereby a man lays hold of 
Christ; second, the community of life with Him contracted by 
means of this faith/* There is still another fact, the greatest 
of all: that it is by an act of Divine power that I am in Christ 
and am kept in Him. It is this I want to realize: the Divine- 
ness of my position in Jesus. 

3. Grasp the two sides of the truth. You are holy in 
Christ with a Divine holiness. In the faith of that, you are to 
he holy, to become holy with a human holiness, the Divine 
Holiness manifest in all the conduct of a human life. 

4. This Christ is a Living Person, a Loving Saviour: how He 
will delight to get complete possession, and do all the work in 
you! Keep hold of this all along as we go on: you have a 
claim on Christ, on His Love and Power, to make you holy. As 
His redeemed one, you are at this moment, whatever and 
wherever you be, in Him. His Holy Presence and Love are 
around you. You are in Him, in the enclosure of that tender- 
love, which ever encircles you with His Holy Presence. In 
that Presence^ accepted and realized^ is your holiness. 



30 HOLT m C HEIST. 



THIRD DAY. 



HOLY IN CHRIST. 
1bollne06 anD Creation* 

" And God blessed the Sabbath day, and sanctified it, because 
that in it He had rested from all the work which God created 
and made." — Gen. ii. 3. 

IN Genesis we have the Book of Beginnings. To 
its first three chapters we are specially in- 
debted for a Divine light shining on the many 
questions to which human wisdom never could 
find an answer. In our search after Holiness, we 
are led thither too. In the whole book of Genesis 
the word Holy occurs but once. But that once in 
such a connection as to open to us the secret 
spring whence flows all that the Bible has to teach 
or to give us of this heavenly blessing. The full 
meaning of the precious word we want to master, 
of the priceless blessing we want to get possession 
of, " Sanctified in Christ^^'' takes its rise in what is 
here written of that wondrous act of God, by which 



HOLINESS IN CREATION. 31 

He closed His creation work, and revealed how 
wonderfully it would be continued and perfected. 
When God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified 
it, He lifted it above the other days, and set it 
apart to a work and a revelation of Himself 
excelling in glory all that had preceded. In this 
simple expression. Scripture reveals to us the 
character of God as the Holy One, who makes holy ; 
the way in which He makes holy, by entering in 
and resting ; and the power of blessing with which 
God's making holy is ever accompanied. These 
three lessons we shall find it of the deepest im- 
portance to study well, as containing the root- 
principles of all the Scripture will have to teach us 
in our pursuit of Holiness. 

1. God sanctified the Sabbath day. Of the 
previous six days the keyword was, from the 
first calling into existence of the heaven and 
the earth, down to the making of man : God 
created. All at once a new word and a new work 
of God, is introduced : God sanctified. Something 
^.higher than creation, that for which creation is to 
exist, is now to be revealed ; God Almighty is now 
to be known as God Most Holy. And just as the 
work of creation shows His Power, without that 
Power being mentioned, so His making holy the 
seventh day reveals His character as the Holy 
One. As Omnipotence is the chief of His natural, 



32 HOLY IJSr CHRIST. 

SO Holiness is the first of His moral attributes. 
And just as He alone is Creator, so He alone is Sanc- 
tifier ; to make holy is His work as truly and ex- 
clusively as to create. Blessed is the child of God 
who truly and fully believes this ! 

God sanctified the Sabbath day. The word can 
teach us what the nature is of the work God does 
when He makes holy. Sanctification in Paradise 
cannot be essentially diff'erent from Sanctification 
in Redemption. God had pronounced all His 
works, and man the chief of them, very good. 
And yet they were not holy. The six days' work 
had nought of defilement or sin, and yet it was 
not holy. The seventh day needed to be specially 
made holy, for the great work of making holy 
man, who was already very good. In Exodus, 
God says distinctly that He sanctified the Sabbath 
day, with a view to man's sanctification. "That 
ye may know that I am the Lord that doth sanctify 
youy Goodness, innocence, purity, freedom from 
sin, is not Holiness. Goodness is the work of om- 
nipotence, an attribute of nature, as God creates 
it: holiness is something infinitely higher. We 
speak of the holiness of God as His infinite moral 
perfection; man's moral perfection could only 
come in the use of his will, consenting freely to 
and abiding in the will of God. Thus alone could 
he become holy. The seventh day was made holy 



HOLINESS m CREATION. 33 

by God as a pledge that He would make man holy. 
In the ages that preceded the seventh day, the 
Creation period, God's Power, Wisdom and Good- 
ness had been displayed. The age to come, in the 
seventh day period, is to be the dispensation of 
holiness : God made holy the seventh day. 

2. God sanctified the Sabbath day, because in it 
He rested from all His work. This rest was some- 
thing real. In Creation, God had, as it were, gone 
out of Himself to bring forth something new : in 
resting He now returns from His creating work 
into Himself, to rejoice in His love over the man 
He has created, and communicate Himself to him. 
This opens up to us the way in which God makes 
holy. The connection between the resting and 
making holy was no arbitrary one ; the making 
holy was no after-thought ; in the very nature of 
things it could not be otherwise : He sanctified 
because He rested in it ; He sanctified by resting. 
As He regards His finished work, more especially 
man, rejoices in it, and, as we have it in Exodus, 
"is refreshed," this time of His Divine rest is tlie 
time in which He will carry on unto perfection 
what He has begun, and make man, created in 
His image, in very deed partaker of His highest 
glory. His Holiness. 

Where God rests in complacency and love, He makes 
holy. The Presence of God revealing itself, enter- 
3 



34 HOLT IN CHRIST. 

ing in, and taking possession, is what constitutes 
true Holiness. As we go down the ages, studying 
the progressive unfolding of what Holiness is, this 
truth will continually meet us. In God's indwell- 
ing in heaven, in His temple on earth, in His be- 
loved Son, in the person of the believer through 
the Holy Spirit, we shall everywhere find that 
Holiness is not something that man is or does, but 
that it always comes where God comes. In the 
deepest meaning of the words : where God enters 
to rest, there He sanctifies. And when we come 
to study the New Testament revelation of the way 
in which we are to be holy, we shall find in this 
one of our earliest and deepest lessons. It is as 
we enter into the rest of God that we become par- 
takers of His Holiness. "We which have be- 
lieved do enter into that rest ; " " He that hath 
entered into his rest hath himself also rested 
from his works, as God did from His." It is as 
the soul ceases from its own eff*orts, and rests in 
Him who has finished all for us, and will finish 
all in us, as the soul yields itself in the quiet con- 
fidence of true faith to rest in God, that it will 
know what true Holiness is. Where the soul 
enters into the Sabbath stillness of perfect trust, 
God comes to keep His Sabbath holy ; and 
the soul where He rests He sanctifies. Whether 
we speak of His own day, " He sanctified it," or 



HOLINESS IN CREATION. 35 

His own people " sanctified in Christ," the secret 
of Holiness is ever the same : " He sanctified be- 
cause he rested." 

3. And then we read, " He blessed and sanctified 
it." As used in the first chapter and throughout 
the book of Genesis, the word " God blessed " is 
one of great significance. " Be fruitful and mul- 
tiply" was, as to Adam, so later to Noah and 
Abraham, the Divine exposition of its meaning. 
The blessing with which God blessed Adam and 
Noah and Abraham was that of fruitfulness and 
increase, the power to reproduce and multiply. 
When God blessed the seventh day, He filled it so 
with the living power of His Holiness, that in it 
that Holiness might increase and reproduce itself 
in those who, like Him, seek to enter into its rest 
and sanctify it. The seventh day is that in which 
we are still living. Of each of the creation days 
it is written, up to the last, " There was evening, 
and there was morning, the sixth day." Of the 
seventh the record has not yet been made; we 
are living in it now, God's own day of rest and 
holiness and blessing. Entering into it in a very 
special manner, and taking possession of it, as 
the time for His rejoicing in His creature, and 
manifesting the fulness of His love in sanctify- 
ing him, He has made the dispensation we now 
live in one of Divine and mighty blessing. And 



36 HOLY IN CHRI8T, 

He has at the same time taught us what the bless- 
ing is. Holiness is blessedness. Fellowship with 
God in His holy rest is blessedness. And as all 
God's blessings in Christ have but one fountain, 
God's Holiness, so they all have but one aim, mak- 
ing us partakers of that Holiness. God created, 
and blessed; with the creation blessing. God sanc- 
tified, and blessed; with the Sabbath blessing of 
His rest. The Creation blessing, of goodness and 
fruitfulness and dominion, is to be crowned by 
the Sabbath blessing of rest in God and holiness 
in fellowship with Him. 

God's finished work of Creation was marred by 
sin, and our fellowship with Him in the blessing 
of His holy rest cut ofi*. The finished work of re- 
demption opened for us a truer rest and a surer 
entrance into the Holiness of God. As He 
rested in His holy day, so He now rests in His 
Holy Son. In Him we now can enter fully into 
the rest of God. " Made holy in Christ," let us 
rest in Him. Let us rest, because we see that as 
wonderfully as God by His mighty power finished 
His work of Creation, will He complete and per- 
fect His work of sanctification. Let us yield our- 
selves to God in Christ, to rest where He rested, to 
be made holy with His own holiness, and to be 
blessed with God's own blessing. God the Sanc- 
tifier is the name now inscribed upon the throne 



HOLINESS m CREATION, 37 

of God the Creator. At the threshold of the 
history of the human race there shines this word 
of infinite promise and hope : " God blessed and 
sanctified the seventh day because in it He rested." 

Be ye holy, for I am holy. 



Blessed Lord God ! I bow before Thee in lowly 
worship. I adore Thee as God the Creator, and 
God the Sanctifier. Thou hast revealed Thyself 
as God Almighty and God Most Holy. I beseech 
Thee, teach me to know and to trust Thee as such. 

I humbly ask Thee for grace to learn and hold 
fast the deep spiritual truths Thou hast revealed 
in making holy the Sabbath day. Thy purpose 
in man's creation is to show forth Thy Holiness, 
and make him partaker of it. Oh, teach me to 
believe in Thee as God my Creator and Sanctifier, 
to believe with my whole heart that the same Al- 
mighty power which gave the sixth-day blessing 
of creation, secures to us the seventh-day blessing 
of sanctification. Thy will is our sanctification. 

And teach me. Lord, to understand better how 
this blessing comes. It is where Thou enterest to 
rest^ to refresh and reveal Thyself, that Thou 
makest holy. O my God ! may my heart be Thy 
resting-place. I would, in the stillness and con- 



38 HOLY IN CHRIST. 

fidence of a restful faith, rest in Thee, believing 
that Thou doest all in me. Let such fellowship 
with Thee, and Thy love, and Thy will be to me 
the secret of a life of holiness. I ask it in the 
name of our Lord Jesus, in whom Thou hast sanc- 
tified us. Amen. 

1. God the Creator is God the Sanctifier. The Omnipotence 
that did the first work does the second too. I can trust God Al- 
mighty to make me holy. God is holy : if God is everything 
to me, His presence will be my holiness. 

2. Rest is ceasing from work, not to work no more, but to be- 
gin a new work. God rests and begins at once to make holy 
that in which He rests. He created by the word of His power; 
He rests in His love. Creation was the building of the temple ; 
sanctification is the entering in and taking possession. Oh, that 
wonderful entering into human nature ! 

3. God rests only in what is restful, wholly at His disposal. 
It is in the restfulness of faith that we must look to God the 
Sanctifier ; He will come in and keep His holy Sabbath in the 
restful soul. We rest in God's rest ; God rests in our rest. 

4. The God that rests in man whom He made, and in resting 
sanctifies, and in sanctifying blesses : this is our God ; praise 
and worship Him. And trust Him to do His work. 

5. Rest! what a simple word. The Rest of God! what an 
inconceivable fulness of Life and Love in that word. Let us 
meditate on it and worship before Him, until it overshadow us 
and we enter into it — the Rest of God. Rest belongeth unto God : 
He alone can give it, by making us share His own. 



HOLINESS AND REVELATION. 39 



FOURTH DAY. 



HOLY IN CHRIST. 
1boltne60 anD IRevelatlon* 

"And when the Lord saw that Moses turned aside to see, He 
called unto him out of the midst of the bush, and said, Moses, 
Moses, And he said, Here am I. And He said, Draw not nigh 
hither ; put off thy shoes from thy feet, for the place whereon 
thou standest is holy ground. And Moses hid his face, for He 
was afraid to look upon God.'^ — Ex. iii. 4-6. 

AND why was it holy ground ? Because God 
had come there and occupied it. Where 
God is, there is holiness ; it is the presence of God 
makes holy. This is the truth we meet with in 
Paradise when man was just created ; here, where 
Scripture uses the word Holy for the second time, 
it is repeated and enforced. A careful study of the 
word in the light of the burning bush will further 
open its deep significance. Let us see what the 
sacred history, what the revelation of God, and 
what Moses teaches us of this holy ground. 

1. Note the place this first direct revelation of 



40 HOLT m CHBIST. 

God to man as the Holy One takes in sacred 
history. In Paradise we found the word Holy 
used of the seventh day. Since that time twenty- 
five centuries have elapsed. We found in God's 
.sanctifying the day of rest a promise of a new 
dispensation — the revelation of the Almighty 
Creator to be followed by that of the Holy One 
n:iaking holy. And yet throughout the book of 
Genesis the word never occurs again ; it is as if 
God's Holiness is in abeyance ; only in Exodus, 
with the calling of Moses, does it make its appear- 
ance again. This is a fact of deep import. Just 
as a parent or teacher seeks, in early childhood, to 
impress one lesson at a time, so God deals in the 
education of the human race. After having in the 
flood exhibited His righteous judgment against sin. 
He calls Abraham to be the father of a chosen peo- 
ple. And as the foundation of all His dealings 
with that people. He teaches him and his seed first 
of all the lesson of childlike trust — trust in Him as 
the Almighty, with whom nothing is too wonder- 
ful, and trust in Him as the Faithful One, whose 
oath could not be broken. With the growth of 
Israel to a people we see the revelation advancing 
to a new stage. The simplicity of childhood gives 
way to the waywardness of youth, and God must 
now interfere with the discipline and restriction of 
law. Having gained a right to a place in their 



HOLINESS AND REVELATION 41 

confidence as the God of their fathers, He prepares 
them for a further revelation. Of the God of 
Abraham the chief attribute was that He was the 
Almighty One ; of the God of Israel, Jehovah, 
that He is the Holy One. 

And what is to be the special mark of the new 
period that is now about to be inaugurated, and 
which is introduced by the word holy ? God tells 
Moses that He is now about to reveal Himself in a 
new character. He had been known to Abraham 
as God Almighty, the God of Promise. Ex, vi. 3. 
He would now manifest Himself as Jehovah, the 
God of Fulfilment, especially in the redemption 
and deliverance of His people from the oppression 
He had foretold to Abraham. God Almighty is 
the God of Creation : Abraham believed in God, 
" who quickeneth the dead, and calleth the things 
that are not as though they were." Jehovah is 
the God of Redemption and of Holiness. With 
Abraham there was not a word of sin or guilt, and 
therefore not of redemption or holiness. To Israel 
the law is to be given, to convince of sin and pre- 
pare the way for holiness; it is Jehovah, the Holy 
One of Israel, the Redeemer, who now appears. 
And it is the presence of this Holy One that 
makes the holy ground. 

2. And how does this Presence reveal itself? In 
the burning bush God makes Himself known as 



42 HOLY IN CHRIST. 

dwelling in the midst of the fire. Elsewhere in 
Holy Scripture the connection between fire and the 
Holiness of God is clearly expressed : " The light 
of Israel shall be for a fire, and the Holy One for a 
flame." The nature of fire may be either beneficent 
or destructive. The sun, the great central fire, may 
give life and fruitfulness, or may scorch to death. 
All depends upon occupying the right position, 
upon the relation in which we stand to it. And 
so wherever God the Holy One reveals Him- 
self, we shall find the two sides together: God's 
Holiness as judgment against sin, destroying the 
sinner who remains in it, and as Mercy freeing His 
people from it. Judgment and Mercy ever go 
together. Of the elements of nature there is none 
of such spiritual and mighty energy as Fire: what 
it consumes it takes and changes into its own 
spiritual nature, rejecting as smoke and ashes what 
cannot be assimilated. And so the HoHness of 
God is that infinite Perfection by which He keeps 
Himself free from all that is not Divine, and yet 
has fellowship with the creature, and takes it up 
into union with Himself, destroying and casting 
out all that will not yield itself to Him. 

It is thus as One who dwells in the firCj who is 
a fire, that God reveals Himself at the opening of 
this new redemption period. With Abraham and 
the patriarchs, as we have said, there had been 



HOLINESS AND REVELATION 43 

little teaching about sin or redemption ; the near- 
ness and friendship of God had been revealed. 
Now the law will be given, sin will be naade mani- 
fest, the distance from God will be felt, that man, 
in learning to know himself and his sinfulness, 
may learn to know and long for God to make him 
holy. In all God's revelation of Himself we shall 
find the combination of the two elements, the one 
repelling, the other attracting. In His house He 
will dwell in the midst of Israel, and yet it will 
be in the awful unapproachable solitude and dark- 
ness of the holiest of all within the veil. He will 
come near to them, and yet keep them at a dis- 
tance. As we study the Holiness of God, we 
shall see in increasing clearness how, like fire, it 
repels and attracts, how it combines into one 
His infinite distance and His infinite nearness. 

3. But the distance will be that which comes out 
first and most strongly. This we see in Moses: he 
hid his face, for He feared to look upon God. The 
first impression which God's Holiness produces is 
that of fear and awe. Until man, both as a crea- 
ture and a sinner, learns how high God is above 
him, how different and distant he is from God, 
the Holiness of God will have little real value or 
attraction. Moses hiding his face shows us the 
effect of the drawing nigh of the Holy One, and 
the path to His further revelation. 



44 HOLT m CUBIST. 

How distinctly this comes out in God's own 
words : " Draw not nigh hither ; put off thy shoes 
from off thy feet." Yes, God had drawn nigh, but 
Moses may not. God comes near: man must stand 
back. In the same breath God says, Draw nigh, 
and. Draw not nigh. There can be no knowledge 
of God or nearness to Him, where we have not 
first heard His, Draw not nigh. The sense of sin, of 
unfitness for God's presence, is the groundwork of 
true knowledge or worship of Him as the Holy One. 
^' Put off thy shoes from off thy feet.' ' The shoes 
are the means of intercourse with the world, the 
aids through which the flesh or nature does its will, 
moves about and does its work. In standing upon 
holy ground, all this must be put away. It is with 
naked feet, naked and stript of every covering, that 
man must bow before a holy God. Our utter un- 
fitness to draw nigh or have any dealings with 
the Holy One, is the very first lesson we have to 
learn, if ever we are to participate in His Holi- 
ness. That Put off! must exercise its condemning 
power through our whole being, until we come to 
realize the full extent of its meaning in the great, 
" Put off the old man ; put on the Lord Jesus," and 
what ''" the putting off of the body of the flesh, in 
the circumcision of Christ," is. Yes, all that is of 
nature and the flesh, all that is of our own doing 
or willing or working — our very life, must be put 



HOLINESS AND REVELATION. 45 

off and given unto the death, if God, as the Holy 
One, is to make Himself known to us. 

We have seen before that Holiness is more than 
goodness or freedom from sin : even unfallen 
nature is not holy. Holiness is that awful glory 
by which Divinity is separated from all that is 
created. Therefore even the seraphs veil their faces 
with their wings when they sing the Thrice Holy. 
But oh ! when the distance and the difference 
is not that of the creature only, but of the sinner,, 
who can express, who can realize, the humiliation^ 
the fear, the shame with which we ought to bow 
before the voice of the Holy One ? Alas ! this is \ 
one of the most terrible effects of sin, that it / 
blinds us. We know not how unholy, how abom- \ 
inable, sin and the sinful nature are in God's 1 
sight. We have lost the power of recognizing the '^ 
Holiness of God : heathen philosophy had not 
even the idea of using the word as expressive of 
the moral character of its gods. In losing the light 
of the glory of God, we have lost the power of 
knowing what sin is. And now^ God's first work 
in drawing nigh to us is to make us feel that we 
may not draw nigh as we are ; that there will have 
to be a very real and a very solemn putting off, 
and even giving up to the death, of all that 
appears most lawful and most needful. Not only 
our shoes are soiled with contact with this unholy 



46 HOLY IN CHRIST. 

earth ; even our face must be covered and our 
eyes closed, in token that the eyes of our heart, 
all our human wisdom and understanding, are in- 
capable of beholding the Holy One. The first 
lesson in the school of personal holiness is, to fear 
and hide our face before the Holiness of God. 
^' Thus saith the High and Lofty One, whose name 
is holy, I dwell in the High and Holy Place, and 
with him that is of a contrite and humble spirit." 
Contrition, brokenness of spirit, fear and trembling 
are God's first demand of those who would see 
His Holiness. 

Moses was to be the first preacher of the Holi- 
ness of God. Of the full communication of God's 
Holiness to us in Christ, His first revelation to 
Moses was the type and the pledge. Prom Moses' 
lips the people of Israel, from his pen the Church 
of Christ, was to receive the message, " Be holy : 
I am holy: I make holy." His preparation for 
being the messenger of the Holy One was here, 
where he hid his face, because he was afraid to 
look upon God. It is with the face in the dust, it 
is in the putting off not only of the shoes, but of 
all that has been in contact with the world and 
self and sin, that the soul draws nigh to the fire, 
in which God dwells, and which burns, but does 
not consume. Oh that every believer, who seeks 
to witness for God as the Holy One, might thus 



HOLINESS AND REVELATION. 47 

learn how the fulfilment of the type of the Burn- 
ing Bush is the Crucified Christ, and how, as we 
die with Him, we receive that Baptism of Fire, 
which reveals in each of us what it means : the 
Holy One dwelling in a Burning Bush. Only so 
can we learn what it is to be holy, as He is holy. 

Be ye holy, for I am holy. 



Most Holy God ! I have seen Thee, who dwell- 
est in the fire. I have heard Thy voice. Draw not 
nigh hither; put thy shoes off from thy feet. 
And my soul has feared to look upon God, the 
Holy One. 

And yet, my God! I must see Thee. Thou 
didst create me for Thy likeness. Thou hast 
taught that this likeness is Thy Holiness : '' Be 
holy, as I am holy." my God ! how shall I 
know to be holy, unless I may see Thee, the Holy 
One ? To be holy, I must look upon God. 

I bless Thee for the revelation of Thyself in the 
flames of the thorn-bush, in the fire of the 
accursed tree. I bow in amazement and deep 
abasement at the great sight: Thy Son in the 
weakness of His human nature, in the fire, burn- 
ing but not consumed. my God ! in fear and 
trembling I have yielded myself as a sinner to die 



48 HOLT IN CHRIST. 

like Him. Oh, let the fire consume all that is un- 
holy in me ! Let me too know Thee as the God 
that dwelleth in the fire, to melt down and purge 
out and destroy what is not of Thee, to save and 
take up into Thine own Holiness what is Thine 
own. 

Holy Lord God ! I bow in the dust before 
this great mystery. Reveal to me Thy Holiness, 
that I too may be its witness and its messenger on 
earth. Amen. 

1. Holiness as the fire of God. Praise God that there is a 
Power that can consume the vile and the dross, a Power that 
will not leave it undisturbed. " The bush burning but not con- 
sumed " is not only the motto of the Church in time of perse- 
cution; it is the watchword of every soul in God's sanctifying 
work. 

2. There is a new Theology, which only speaks of the love of 
God as seen in the cross. It sees not the glory of His Righteous- 
ness, and His righteous judgment. This is not the God of 
Scripture. *' Our God is a consuming fire," is New Testament 
Theology. To '' offer service with reverence and awe," is New 
Testament religion. In Holiness, Judgment and Mercy meet. 

3. Holiness as the fear o/ God. Hiding the face before 
God for fear, not daring to look or speak, — this is the beginning 
of rest in God. It is not yet the true rest, but on the way to it. 

( May God give us a deep fear of whatever could grieve or anger 
' Him. May we have a deep fear of ourselves, and all that is of 
[ the old, the condemned nature, lest it rise again. ** The spirit 
of the fear of the Lord" is the first manifestation of the spirit 
of holiness, and prepares the way for the joy of holiness. 
" Walking in the fear of the Lord, and in the comfort of the 
Holy Ghost; " these are the two sides of the Christian life. 



HOLINESS AND REVELATION. 49 

4. The Holiness of God was revealed to Moses that he might 
be its messenger. The Church needs nothing so much to-day 
as men and women who can testify for the holiness of God, 
Will you be one ? 



NOTE. 

The connection between the fear of God and 
holiness is most intimate. There are some who 
seek most earnestly for holiness, and yet never 
exhibit it in a light that will attract the world or 
even believers, because this element is wanting. 
It is the fear of the Lord that works that meek-\ 
ness and gentleness, that deliverance from self-1 
confidence and self-consciousness, which form the > 
true groundwork of a saintly character. The pas- 
sages of God's Word in which the two words are 
linked together are well worthy of a careful study. 
"Who is like unto Thee, glorious in holiness, 
fearful in praises? " " In Thy fear will I worship 
towards Thy holy temple." " 6 fear the Lord, ye 
His holy ones.^^ " O worship the Lord in the 
beauty of holiness ; fear before Him, all the eartli." 
''Let them praise Thy great and terrible name; 
holy is He." " The /€ar of the Lord is the begin- 
ning of wisdom ; and the knowledge of the Holy 
One is understanding." '' The Lord of hosts, Him^ 
shall ye sanctify; let Him be your /^ar, and let! 
Him be your dread." " Perfecting holiness in the^ 
fear of the Lord." ^' Like as He which called you 
is holy, be ye yourselves also holy ; and if ye call 
on Him as father, pass the time of your sojourning 
in /ear." And so on through the whole of Scripture^ 
. 4 



50 HOLT IN CHBIST. 

from the Song of Moses on to the Song of the 
Lamb : '^ Who shall not fear Thee, O Lord ! and 
glorify Thy name, for Thou only art holy,^"^ If we 
yield ourselves to the impression of such passages, 
we shall feel more deeply that the fear of God, the 
tender fear of in any way offending Him, the fear 
especially of entering into His holy presence with 
what is human and carnal, with aught of our own 
wisdom and effort, is of the very essence of the 
holiness we are to follow after. It is this fear of 
God will make us, like Moses, fall down and hide 
our face in God's presence, and wait for His own 
Holy Spirit to open in us the eyes, and breathe in 
us the thoughts and the worship, with which we 
draw nigh to Him, the Holy One. It is in this 
holy fear that that stillness of soul is wrought 
which leads it to rest in God, and opens the way 
for what we saw in Paradise to be the secret of 
holiness: God keeping His Sabbath, arid sanctify- 
ing the soul in which He rests. 



HOLINESS AND REDEMPTION 51 



FIFTH DAY. 



HOLY IN CHRIST. 
Iboltneaa anD IRcDemptfon* 

" Sanctify unto me all the first-born." — Ex. xiii. 2. 

"All the first-born are mine; for on the day I smote all the 
first-born in the land of Egypt I sanctified unto me all the first- 
born in Israel : mine they shall be : I am the Lord." — Num, iii, 
13, viii. 17. 

*'For I am the Lord your God that bringeth you up out of 
the land of Egypt to be your God : ye shall therefore be holy, 
for I am holy.'* — Lev. xi. 45. 

** I have redeemed thee ; thou art mine." — Isa. xliii. 1. 

AT Horeb we saw how the first mention of the 
word holy in the history of fallen man was 
connected with the inauguration of a new period 
in the revelation of God, that of Redemption. In 
the passover we have the first manifestation of 
what Redemption is ; and here the more frequent 
use of the word holy begins. In the feast of un- 
leavened bread we have the symbol of the putting 
off of the old and the putting on of the new, to 
which redemption through blood is to lead. Of 



52 HOLY IN CHRIST. 

the seven days we read ; " In the first day there 
shall be an holy convocation, and in the seventh 
day there shall be an holy convocation ; " the meet- 
ing of the redeemed people to commemorate its 
deliverance is a holy gathering ; they meet under 
the covering of their Redeemer, the Holy One. 
As soon as the people had been redeemed from 
Egypt, God's very first word to them was, 
'' Sanctify — make holy unto me all the first-born : 
it is mine." See Ex, xiii. 2. The word reveals 
how proprietorship is one of the central thoughts 
both in redemption and in sanctification, the link 
that binds them together. And though the word 
is here only used of the first-born, they are re- 
garded as the type of the whole people. We 
know how all growth and organization commence 
from a centre, around which in ever-widening cir- 
cles the life of the organism spreads. If holiness 
in the human race is to be true and real, free as 
that of God, it must be the result of a self-appro- 
priating development. And so the first-born are 
sanctified, and afterwards the priests in their 
place, as the type of what the whole people is to 
be as God's first-born among the nations. His 
peculiar treasure, '^ an holy nation." This idea of 
proprietorship as related to redemption and sanc- 
tification comes out with especial clearness when 
God speaks of the exchange of the priests for the 



HOLINESS AND REDEMPTION, 53 

first-born {^Nam. iii. 12, 13, viii. 16, 17): "The 
Levites are wholly given unto me; instead of the 
first-born have I taken them unto me; for all the first- 
born are mine; in the day that I smote every 
first-born in the land of Egypt I sanctified them for 
my self y 

Let us try and realize the relation existing 
between redemption and holiness. In Paradise 
we saw what God's sanctifying the seventh day 
was : He took possession of it, He blessed it, He 
rested in it and refreshed Himself. Where God 
enters and rests, there is holiness : the more per- 
fectly the object is fitted for Him to enter and 
dwell, the more perfect the holiness. The seventh 
day was sanctified as the period for man's sancti- 
fication. At the very first step God took to lead"] 
him to His Holiness — the command not to eat of i 
the tree — man fell. God did not give up His \ 
plan, but had now to pursue a difi'erent and 
slower path. After twenty-five centuries' slow but 
needful preparation. He now reveals Himself as \ 
the Redeemer. A people whom He had chosen 
and formed for Himself He gives up to oppression 
and slavery, that their hearts may be prepared to 
long for and welcome a Deliverer. In a series of ^ 
mighty wonders He proves Himself the Conqueror ' 
of their enemies, and then, in the blood of the 
Paschal Lamb on their doors, teaches thetn w^hat 



64 HOLT m CHBI8T. 

redemption is, not only from an unjust oppressor 
here on earth, but from the righteous judgment 
their sins had deserved. The Passover is to be to 
them the transition from the seen and temporal 
to the unseen and spiritual, revealing God not 
only as the Mighty but as the Holy One, freeing 
them not only from the house of bondage but the 
Destroying Angel. 

And having thus redeemed them. He tells them 
that they are now His own. During their stay at 
Sinai and in the wilderness, the thought is contin- 
ually pressed upon them that they are now the 
Lord's people, whom He has made His own by 
the strength of His arm, that He may make them 
holy for Himself, even as He is holy. The pur- 
pose of redemption is Possession, and the purpose 
of Possession is likeness to Him who is Redeemer 
and Owner, is Holiness. 

In regard to this Holiness, and the way it is to 
be attained as the result of redemption, there is 
more than one lesson the sanctifying of the first- 
born will teach us. 

First of all, we want to realize how inseparable 
redemption and holiness are. Neither can exist 
without the other. Only redemption leads to holi- 
ness. If I am seeking holiness, I must abide in 
the clear and full experience of being a redeemed 
one, and as such of being owned and possessed by 



HOLmESS AND REDEMPTION. 55 

God. Redemption is too often looked at from its 
negative side as deliverance from : its real glory is 
the positive element of being redeemed unto Him- 
self. Full possession of a house means occupa-1 
tion : if I own a house without occupying it, it 
may be the home of all that is foul and evil. 
God has redeemed me and made me His own with 
the view of getting complete possession of me. 
He says of my soul, ''It is mine," and seeks to 
have His right of ownership acknowledged and 
made fully manifest. That will be perfect holi- 
ness, where God has entered in and taken com-\ 
plete and entire possession.^ It is redemption \ 
gives God His right and power over me ; it is re- i 
demption sets me free for God now to possess and ' 
bless : it is redemption realized and filling my 
soul, that will bring me the assurance and experi- 
ence of all His power will work in me. In God, 
redemption and sanctification are one : the more 
redemption as a Divine reality possesses me, the 
closer am I linked to the Redeemer-God, the Holy^. 
One. 

And just so, only holiness brings the assurance and\ 
enjoyment of redemption. If I am seeking to hold I 
fast redemption on lower ground, I may be de- ' 
ceived. If I have become unwatchful or careless, 
I should tremble at the very idea of trusting iu 

^ See Note A on Holiness as Proprietorship. 



66 HOLY m CHRIST, 

redemption apart from holiness as its object. To 

Israel God spake, " I brought you up out of the 

land of Egypt : therefore ye shall be holy, for I am 

holy." It is God the Redeemer who made us His 

^own, who calls us too to be holy : let Holiness be 

' to us the most essential, the most precious part 

of redemption : the yielding of ourselves to Him 

who has taken us as His own, and has undertaken 

, to make us His own entirely. 

A second lesson suggested is the connection be- 
tween God's and man's working in sanctification. 
To Moses the Lord speaks, ^''Sanctify unto me all 
the first-born." He afterwards say^, ^'I sanctified 
all the first-born for myself." What God does He 
does to be carried out and appropriated through 
us. When He tells us that we are made holy in 
Christ Jesus, that we are His holy ones. He speaks 
not only of His purpose, but of what He has 
really done ; we have been sanctified in the one 
oflfering of Christ, and in our being created anew 
in Him. But this work has a human side. To 
us comes the call to be holy, to follow after holi- 
ness, to perfect holiness. God has made us His 
own, and allows us to say that we are His : but 
He waits for us now to yield Him an enlarged 
entrance into the secret places of our inner being, 
for Him to fill it all with His fulness. Holiness 
is not something we bring to God or do for Him. 



HOLINESS AND REDEMPTION 57 

Holiness is what there is of God in us. God has 
made us His own in redemption, that He might 
make Himself our own in sanctification. And 
our work in becoming holy is the bringing our 
whole life, and every part of it, into subjection to 
the rule of this holy God, putting every member 
and every power upon His altar. 

And this teaches us the answer to the question 
as to the connection between the sudden and the 
gradual in sanctification : between its being a 
thing once for all complete, and yet imperfect and 
needing to be perfected. What God sanctifies is 
holy with a Divine and perfect holiness as His 
gift : man has to sanctify by acknowledging and 
maintaining and carrying out that holiness in 
relation to what God has made holy. God sancti- 
fied the Sabbath day: man has to sanctify 
it, that is, to keep it holy. God sanctified the 
first-born as His own: Israel had to sanctify 
them, to treat them and give them up to God 
as holy. God is holy : we are to sanctify Him 
in acknowledging and adorning and honoring 
that holiness. God has sanctified His great 
name. His name is Holy : we sanctify or hallow 
that name as we fear and trust and use it as the 
revelation of His Holiness. God sanctified Christ: 
Christ sanctified Himself, manifesting in His per- 
sonal will and action perfect conformity to the Ho- 



68 HOLY m CHRIST. 

liness with which God had made Him holy. God 
has sanctified us in Christ Jesus : we are to be holy 
by yielding ourselves to the power of that holi- 
ness, by acting it out, and manifesting it in all 
our life and walk. The objective Divine gift, be- 
stowed once for all and completely, must be ap- 
' propriated as a subjective personal possession; we 
must cleanse ourselves, perfecting holiness. Re- 
deemed unto holiness : as the two thoughts are 
linked in the mind and work of God, they must 
be linked in our heart and life. 

When Isaiah announced the second, the true re- 
demption, it was given to him, even more clearly 
and fully than to Moses, to reveal the name of 
God as " The Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel." 
The more we study this name, and hallow it, and 
worship God by it, the more inseparably will the 
words become connected, and we shall see how, 
as the Redeemer is the Holy One, the redeemed 
are holy ones too. Isaiah says of " the way of 
holiness," the "redeemed shall walk therein." 
The redemption that comes out from the Holiness 
of God must lead up into it too. We shall under- 
stand that to be redeemed in Christ is to be holy 
in Christ, and the call of our redeeming God will 
acquire new meaning : " I am holy : be ye holy^ 

Be ye holy, for I am holy. 



HOLINESS AND REDEMPTION 59 

Lord God! the Holy One of Israel and his 
Redeemer! I worship before Thee in deep humil- 
ity. I confess with shame that I so long sought 
Thee more as the Redeemer than as the Holy One. 
I knew not that it was as the Holy One Thou 
hadst redeemed, that redemption was the outcome 
and the fruit of Thy Holiness; that a participa- 
tion in Thy Holiness was its one purpose and its 
highest beauty. I only thought of being re- 
deemed from bondage and death : like Israel, I 
understood not that without fellowship and con- 
formity to Thyself redemption would lose its 
value. 

Most holy God ! I praise Thee for the patience'^ 
with which Thou bearest with the selfishness and 
the slowness of Thy redeemed ones. I praise 
Thee for the teaching of the Spirit of Thy Holi- ■ 
ness, leading Thy saints, and me too, to see how 
it is Thy Holiness, and the call to become par- 
taker of it, that gives redemption its value ; how 
it is for Thyself as the Holy One, to be Thine 
own, possessed and sanctified of Thee, that we 
are redeemed. 

O my God ! with a love and a joy and a thanks- 
giving that cannot be uttered, I praise Thee for 
Christ, who has been made unto us of Thee sanc- 
tification and redemption. In Him Thou art my 
Redeemer, my Holy One. In Him I am Thy re- 



60 HOLY IN CUBIST. 

deemed, Thy holy one. God ! in speechless 
adoration I fall down to worship the love that 
passeth knowledge, that hath done this for us, and 
.to believe that in one who is now before Thee, 
holy in Christ, Thou wilt fulfil all Thy glorious 
purposes according to the greatness of Thy power. 
Amen. 

1. " Redemption through His blood." The blood we meet at 
the threshold of the pathway of Holiness. For it is the blood 
of the sacrifice which the fire of God consumed, and yet could 
not consume. That blood has such power of holiness in it, that 
we read, " Sanctified by His own blood." Always think of holi- 
ness, or pray for it, as one redeemed by blood. Live under the 
covering of the blood in its daily cleansing power. 

2. It is only as we know the Holiness of God as Fire, and 
bow before His righteous judgment, that we can appreciate the 
preciousness of the blood or the reality of the redemption. As 
long as we only think of the love of God as goodness, we may 
aim at being good ; faith in God who redeems will waken in us 
the need and the joy of being holy in Christ. 

3. Have you understood the right of property God has in 
what He has redeemed ? Have you heard a voice say, Mine, 
Thou art Mine. Ask God very humbly to speak it to you. 
Listen very gently for it. 

4. The holiness of the creature has its origin in the Divine 
^ill, in the Divine election, redemption, and possession. Give 
yourself up to this will of God and rejoice in it. 

5. As God created, so He redeemed, to sanctify. Have great 
faith in Him for this. 

6. Let God have the entire possession and disposal of you. 
Holiness is His ; our holiness is to let Him, the Holy One, be 
all. 



HOLINESS AND GLORY, 61 



SIXTH DAY. 



HOLY IN CHRIST. 
1bolinc66 anO ©lotis* 

" Who is like unto Thee, O Lord ! among the gods ? 

Who is like unto Thee, glorious in holiness^ 

Fearful in praises, doing wonders ? 

Thou in Thy mercy hast led Thy people which Thou hast 
redeemed : 

Thou hast guided them in Thy strength to the habitation of 
Thy holiness, . . 

The holy place, O Lord, which Thy hands have established/' 

—Ex. XV. 11-17. 

IN these words we have another step in advance 
in the revelation of Holiness. We have here 
for the first time Holiness predicated of God Him- 
self. He is glorious in holiness : and it is to the 
dwelling-place of His Holiness that He is guiding 
His people. 

Let us first note the expression used here: 
glorious in holiness. Throughout Scripture we 
find the glory and the holiness of God mentioned 
together. In Ex. xxix. 43 we read, " And the tent 



62 HOLT IJSr CHRIST. 

shall be made holy by my glory^'" that glory of the 
Lord of which we afterwards read that it filled the 
^ house. The glory of an object, of a thing or per- 
I son, is its intrinsic worth or excellence : to glorify 
I is to remove everything that could hinder the full 
I revelation of that excellence. In the Holiness of 
I God His glory is hidden ; in the glory of God 
His Holiness is manifested: His glory, the reve- 
lation of Himself as the Holy One, would make 
the house holy. In the same way the two are 
connected in Lev, x. 3, " I will be sanctified in 
them that come nigh unto me, and before all the 
people I will be glorified.'^^ The acknowledgment 
of His Holiness in the priests would be the mani- 
festation of His glory to the people. So, too, in 
the song of the Seraphim, Lsa, vi. 3, ^'Holy, holy, 
holy, Lord God of Hosts : the whole earth is full of 
His glory^ God is He who dwelleth in a light 
that is unapproachable, whom no man hath seen 
or can see: it is the light of the knowledge of the 
glory of God that He gives into our hearts. The 
glory is that which can be seen and known of the 
invisible and unapproachable light: that light it- 
self, and the glorious fire of which that light is the 
shining out, that light is the Holiness of God. 
Holiness is not so much an attribute of God, as 
the comprehensive summary of all His perfec- 
tions. 



HO LINE 88 AND GLORY. B3 

It is on the shore of the Red Sea that Israel 
thus praises God : " Who is like unto Thee, O 
Lord ! Who is like unto Thee, glorious in holi- 
ness?" He is the Incomparable One, there is 
none like Him. And wherein has He proved 
this, and revealed the glory of His Holiness? 
With Moses in Horeb we saw God's glory in the 
fire, in its double aspect of salvation and destruc- 
tion : consuming what could not be purified, puri- 
fying what was not consumed. We see it here 
too in the song of Moses : Israel sings of judgment 
and of mercy. The pillar of fire and of the cloud 
came between the camp of the Egyptians and the 
camp of Israel: it was a cloud and darkness to 
those, but it gave light by night to these. The 
two thoughts run through the whole song. But 
in the two verses that follow the ascription of holi- 
ness, we find the sum of the whole. " Thou 
stretchedst out Thy right hand : the earth swal- 
lowed them." "The Lord looked forth upon the 
host of the Egyptians from the pillar of fire and 
discomfited them." This is the glory of Holiness 
as judgment and destruction of the enemy. 
^' Thou in Thy mercy hast led Thy people which 
thou hast redeemed. Thou hast guided them in 
Thy strength to the habitation of Thy Holiness." 
This is the glory of Holiness in mercy and re- 
demption — a Holiness that not only delivers but 



64 HOLY m CHRIST. 

guides to the habitation of holiness, where the 
Holy One is to dwell with and in His people. In 
the inspiration of the hour of triumph it is thus 
early revealed that the great object and fruit of re- 
demption, as wrought out by the Holy One, is to 
be His indwelling ; with nothing short of this can 
the Holy One rest content, or the full glory of His 
Holiness be made manifest. 

And now, observe further, how, as it is in the 
redemption of His people that God's Holiness is 
revealed, so it is in the song of redemption that the 
personal ascription of Holiness to God is found. 
We know how in Scripture, after some striking 
special interposition of God as Redeemer, the 
special influence of the Spirit is manifested in 
some song of praise. It is remarkable how it is 
in these outbursts of holy enthusiasm, God is 
praised as the Holy One. See it in the song of 
Hannah, 1 Sam, ii. 2, " There is none holy as the 
Lord." The language of the Seraphim (/sa. vi.) 
is that of a song of adoration. In the great day 
of Israel's deliverance the song will be, '^ The Lord 
Jehovah is become my strength and song. Sing 
unto the Lord, for He hath done excellent things. 
Cry aloud and shout, thou inhabitant of Zion, for 
great is the Holy One of Israel in the midst of 
thee." Mary sings, " For He that is mighty hath 
done great things to me: and holy is His name." 



HOLINESS AND GLORY. 65 

The book of Revelation reveals the living crea- 
tures giving glory and honor and thanks to Him 
that sitteth on the throne; "and they have no 
rest day and night, saying, Holy, holy, holy^ is 
the Lord God, the Almighty, which was, and 
which is, and which is to come." And when the 
song of Moses and of the Lamb is sung by the 
sea of glass, it will still be, '' Who shall not fear, 
O Lord, and glorify Thy name? for Thou only 
art holy." It is in the moments of highest 
inspiration, under the fullest manifestation of 
God's redeeming power, that His servants speak 
of His Holiness. In Ps. xcvii. we read, " Rejoice 
in the Lord, ye righteous, and give thanks at the 
remembrance of His Holiness." And in Ps. 
xcix., which has, with its thrice repeated holy^ 
been called the echo on earth of the Thrice Holy 
of heaven, we sing — 

Let them praise Thy great and terrible name. 
Holy is He. 

Exalt ye the Lord our God, 
and worship at His footstool : 
Holy is He. 

Exalt ye the Lord our God, 
and worship at His holy hill ; 
For the Lord our God is holy. 
5 



66 HOLY IN CHRIST, 

It is only under the influence of high spiritual 
elevation and joy that God's holiness can be fully 
apprehended or rightly worshipped. The senti- 
ment that becomes us as we worship the Holy 
One, that fits us for knowing and worshipping Him 
aright, is the spirit of praise that sings and shouts 
for joy in the experience of His full salvation. 

But is not this at variance with the lesson we 
learnt at Horeb, when God spake, " Draw not nigh 
hither: put ofi" thy shoes," and where Moses 
feared and hid his face ? And is not this in very 
deed the posture that becomes us as-creatures and 
sinners? It is indeed : and yet the two sentiments 
are not at variance : rather they are indispensable 
to each other ; the fear is the preparation for the 
praise and the glory. Or is it not that same 
Moses who hid his face and feared to look upon 
God, who afterwards beheld His glory until his 
own face shone with a brightness that men could 
not bear to look upon ? And is not the song that 
sings here of God as glorious in holiness, also the 
f?ong of Moses who feared and hid his face ? Have 
we not seen in the fire, and in God, and specially 
in His Holiness, the twofold aspect ; consuming 
and purifying, repelling and attracting, judging 
and saving, with the latter in each case not only the 
accompaniment but the result of the former ? And 
so we shall find that the deeper the humbling and 



HOLINESS AND GLOBY, 67 

the fear in God's Holy Presence, and the more real 
and complete the putting off of all that is of self 
and of nature, even to the putting off, the com- 
plete death of the old man and his will, the more 
hearty the giving up to be consumed of what is 
sinful, the deeper and fuller will be the praise and 
joy with which we daily sing our song of redemp- 
tion : " Who is like unto Thee, Lord, glorious 
in holiness, fearful in praises, doing wonders? " 

"Glorious in holiness ; fearful in praises:" the 
song itself harmonizes the apparently conflicting 
elements. Yes, I will sing of judgment and of 
mercy. I will rejoice with trembling as I praise 
the Holy One. As I look upon the two sides of 
His Holiness, as revealed to the Egyptians and 
the Israelites, I remember that what was there 
separated is in me united. By nature I am the 
Egyptian, an enemy doomed to destruction ; by 
grace, an Israelite chosen for redemption. In me 
the fire must consume and destroy ; only as judg- 
ment does its work, can mercy fully save. It is 
only as I tremble before the Searching Light and 
the Burning Fire and the Consuming Heat of the 
Holy One, as I yield the Egyptian nature to be 
judged and condemned and slain, that the Israel- 
ite will be redeemed to know aright his God as 
the God of salvation, and to rejoice in Him. 

Blessed be God! the judgment is past. In 



68 HOLY IN CHRIST. 

Christ, the burning bush, the fire of the Divine 
Holiness did its double work : in Him sin was 
condemned in the flesh; in Him we are free. In 
giving up His will to the death, and doing God's 
will, Christ sanctified Himself; and in that will- 
we are sanctified too. His crucifixion, with its 
judgment of the flesh. His death, with its entire 
putting off of what is of nature, is not only for us, 
but is really ours ; a life and a power working with- 
in us by His Spirit. Day by day we abide in Him. 
Tremblingly but rejoicingly we take our stand 
in Him, for the Power of Holiness as Judgment to 
vindicate within us its fierce vengeance against 
what is sin and flesh, and so to let the Power of 
Holiness as Redemption accomplish that glorious 
work that makes us give thanks at the remem- 
brance of His Holiness. And so the shout of Salva- 
tion rings ever deeper and truer and louder through 
our life, " Who is like unto Thee, Lord, among 
the gods? Who is like unto Thee, glorious in 
holiness, fearful in praises, doing wonders ? " 

Be ye holy, as I am holy. 



^^ Who is like unto Thee, Lord ! glorious in 
holiness, fearful in praises, doing wonders ? " With 
my whole heart would I join in this song of re- 



HOLmESS AFD GLORY, 69 

demption, and rejoice in Thee as the God of my 
salvation. 

my God ! let Thy Spirit, from whom these 
words of holy joy and triumph came, so reveal 
within me the great redemption as a personal ex- 
perience, that my whole life may be one song of 
trembling and adoring wonder. 

1 beseech Thee especially, let my whole heart 
be filled with Thyself, glorious in holiness, fearful 
in praises, who alone doest wonders. Let the fear 
of Thy Holiness make me tremble at all there is 
in me of self and flesh, and lead me in my wor- 
ship to deny and crucify my own wisdom, that 
the Spirit of Thy Holiness may breathe in me. 
Let the fear of the Lord give its deep undertone 
to all my coming in and going out in Thy Holy 
Presence. Prepare me thus for giving praise with- 
out ceasing at the remembrance of Thy holiness. 
O my God ! I would rejoice in Thee as my Re- 
deemer, MY Holy One, with a joy unspeakable 
and full of glory. As my Redeemer, Thou makest 
me holy. With my whole heart do I trust Thee to 
do it, to sanctify me wholly. I do believe in Thy 
promise. I do believe in Thyself, and believing I 
receive Thee, the Holy One, my Redeemer. 

Who is like unto Thee, Lord ! glorious in 
holiness, fearful in praises, doing wonders ? 



70 HOLY IN CHRIST. 

1. God^s Holiness as Glory, God is glorified in the holiness 
of His people. True holiness always gives glory to God alone. 
Live to the glory of God : that is holiness. Live holily : that 
will glorify God. To lose sight of self, and seek only God's 
glory, is holiness. 

2. Our Holiness as Praise. Praise gives glory to God, and 
is thus an element of holiness. " Thou art holy, Thou that in- 
habitest the praises of Israel.'* 

3. God's Holiness, His holy redeeming love, is cause of un- 
ceasing joy and praise. Praise God every day for it. But you 
cannot do this unless you live in it. May God's holiness be- 
come so glorious to us, as we understand that whatever we see 
of His glory is just the outshining of His holiness, that we 
cannot help rejoicing in it, and in Him the Holy One. 

4. The spirit of the fear of the Lord and the spirit of praise 
may, at first sight, appear to be at variance. But it is not so. 
The humility that fears the Holy One will also praise Him : 
*' Ye that fear the Lord : praise the Lord." The lower we lie 
in the fear of God, and the fear of self, the more surely will 
He lift us up in due time to praise Him. 



HOLINESS AND OBEDIENCE, 71 



SEVENTH DAY. 



HOLY IN CHRIST. 
1bollne66 anD ©bcDlence* 

** Ye have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bare 
you on eagles' wings, and brought you unto myself. Now 
therefore, if ye will obey my voice indeed, and keep my cove- 
nant, ye shall be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people: 
ye shall be unto me an holy nation." — Ex. xix. 4-6. 

ISRAEL has reached Horeb. The law is to be 
given and the covenant made. Here are God's 
first words to the people; He speaks of redemp- 
tion and its blessing, fellowship with Himself: 
*' Ye have seen how I brought you unto /myself .'''^ 
He speaks of holiness as His purpose in redemp- 
tion : " Ye shall be unto me an holy nation." And 
as the link between the two He places obedience : 
"If ye will indeed obey my voice, ye shall be unto 
me an holy nation." God's will is the expression 
of His holiness; as we do His will, we come into 
contact with His holiness. The link between Re- 
demption and Holiness is Obedience. 



72 HOLY m CHRIST, 

This takes us back to what we saw in Paradise. 
God sanctified the seventh day as the time for 
sanctifying man. And what was the first thing 
He did with this purpose ? He gave him a com- 
mandment. Obedience to that commandment 
would have opened the door, would have been the 
entrance, into the Holiness of God. Holiness is 
a moral attribute ; and moral is that which a free 
will chooses and determines for itself. What God 
creates and gives is only naturally good ; what 
man wills to have of God and His will, and really 
appropriates, has moral worth, and leads to holi- 
ness. In creation God manifested His wise and 
good will. His holy will He speaks in His com- 
mands. As that holy will enters man's will, as 
man's will accepts and unites itself with God's 
will, he becomes holy. After creation, in the 
seventh day, God took man up into His work of 
sanctification to make him holy. Obedience is the 
path to holiness, because it is the path to union 
with God's holy will; with man unfallen, as with 
fallen man, in redemption here and in glory above, 
in all the holy angels, in Christ the Holy One of 
God Himself, obedience is the path of holiness. 
It is not itself holiness: but as the wdll opens 
itself to accept and to do the will of God, God 
communicates Himself and His Holiness. To 
obey His voice is to follow Him as He leads in 



HOLINESS AND OBEDIENCE, 73 

the way to the full revelation and communication 
of Himself and His blessed nature as the Holy- 
One. 

Obedience. Not knowledge of the will of God, 
not even approval, not even the will to do it, but 
the doing of it. Knowledge, and approval, and 
will must lead to action ; the will of God must be 
done, *' If ye indeed obey my voice, ye shall be 
unto me an holy nation." It is not faith, and not 
worship, and not profession, that God here asks 
in the first place from His people when He speaks 
of holiness; it is obedience. God's will must be 
done on earth, as in heaven. " Remember and do 
all my commandments, that ye may be holy to 
your God." A"z/.m. xv. 40. "Sanctify yourselves 
therefore, and be ye holy ; and ye shall keep my 
statutes and do them. I am the Lord which sanc- 
tify you." Lev, xx. 7, 8. "Therefore shall ye 
keep my commandments and do them : I am the 
Lord: I will be hallowed among the children of 
Israel: I am the Lord which hallow you, that 
brought you up out of the land of Egypt." xxii. 
21, 33. 

A moment's reflection will make the reason of 
this clear to us. It is in a man's work that he 
manifests what he is. I may know what is good, 
and yet not approve it. I may approve, and yet 
not will it. I may in a certain sense will it, and 



74 HOLY m CHRIST, 

yet be wanting in the energy, or the self-sacrifice, 
or the power that will rouse and do the thing. 
Thinking is easier than willing, and willing is 
easier than doing. Action alone proves whether 
the object of my interest has complete mastery 
over me. God wants His will done. This alone 
is obedience. In this alone it is seen whether the 
whole heart, with all its strength and will, has 
given itself over to the will of God ; whether we 
live it, and are ready at any sacrifice to make it 
our own by doing it. God has no other way for 
making us holy. " Ye shall keep my statutes and 
do them : I am the Lord which make you holy." 
To all seekers after holiness this is a lesson of 
deep importance. Obedience is not holiness ; 
holiness is something far higher, something that 
comes from God to us, or rather, something of 
God coming into us. But obedience is indispens- 
able to holiness : it cannot exist without it. 
While, therefore, your heart seeks to follow the 
teaching of God's word, and looks in faith to 
what God has done, as He has made 3^ou holy in 
Christy and to what God is still to do through the 
Spirit of Holiness as He fulfils the promise, " The 
very God of peace sanctify you wholly," never for 
one moment forget to be obedient. '^ If ye shall 
indeed obey my voice, ye shall be an holy nation 
to me." Begin by doing at once whatever appears 



HOLINESS AND OBEDIENCE. 75 

right to do. Give up at once whatever conscience 
tells that you dare not say is according to the will 
of God. Not only pray for light and strength, but 
act; do what God says. " He that doeth the will 
of God is my brother," Jesus says. Every son of 
God has been begotten of the will of God : in it 
he has his life. To do the Father's will is the 
meat, the strength, the mark, of every son of God. 
It is nothing less than the surrender to such a 
life of simple and entire obedience that is implied 
in becoming a Christian. There are, alas ! too 
many Christians who, from the want either of 
proper instruction, or of proper attention to the 
teaching of God's word, have never realized the 
place of supreme importance that obedience takes 
in the Christian life. They know not that Christ, 
and redemption, and faith all lead to it, because 
through it alone is the way to the fellowship of 
the Love, and the Likeness, and the Glory of God. 
We have all, possibly, suffered from it ourselves: 
in our prayers and efforts after the perfect peace 
and the rest of faith, after the abiding joy and the 
increasing power of the Christian life, there has 
been a secret something hindering the blessing, 
or causing the speedy loss of what had been ap- 
prehended. A wrong impression as to the abso- 
lute necessity of obedience was probably the 
cause. It cannot too earnestly be insisted on that 



76 HOLY m CHRIST. 

the freeness and mighty power of grace has this 
for its object from our conversion onwards, the 
restoring us to the active obedience and harmony 
with God's will from which we had fallen through 
the first sin in Paradise. Obedience leads to God 
and His Holiness. It is in obedience that the will 
is moulded, and the character fashioned, and an 
inner man built up which God can clothe and 
adorn with the beauty of holiness. 

When a Christian discovers that this has been 
the missing link, the cause of failure and dark- 
ness, there is nothing for it but, in a grand act of 
surrender, deliberately to choose obedience, uni- 
versal, whole-hearted obedience, as the law of his 
life in the power of the Holy Spirit. Let him 
not fear to make his own the words of Israel at 
Sinai, in answer to the message of God we are 
considering: "All that the Lord hath spoken, we will 
do ; " "All that the Lord hath said will we do, and 
be obedient.'' What the law could not do, in that 
it was weak through the flesh, God hath done by 
the gift of His Son and Spirit. The law-giving of 
Sinai on tables of stone has been succeeded by 
the law-giving of the Spirit on the table of the 
heart : the Holy Spirit is the power of obedience, 
and is so the Spirit of Holiness, who, in obedience, 
prepares our hearts for being the dwelling of the 
Holy One. Let us in this faith yield ourselves to 



HOLINESS AND OBEDIENCE. 11 

a life of obedience : it is the New Testament path 
to the realization of the promise : ^' If ye will 
obey my voice indeed, ye shall be unto me an holy 
nation." 

We have already seen how holiness in its very 
nature supposes the personal relation to God, His 
personal presence. ** I have brought you unto my- 
self ; if ye obey, ye shall be unto me an holy 
nation." It is as we understand and hold fast 
this personal element that obedience will become 
possible, and will lead to holiness. Mark well 
God's words : " If ye will obey my voice^ and keep 
my covenant." The voice is more than a law or a 
book ; it always implies a living person and inter- 
course with him. It is this that is the secret of 
gospel obedience : hearing the voice and following 
the lead of Jesus as a personal friend, a living 
Saviour. It is being led by the Spirit of God, 
having Him to reveal the Presence, and the Will, 
and the Love of the Father, that will work in us 
that personal relation which the New Testament 
means when it speaks of doing everything unto 
the Lord, as pleasing God. 

Such obedience is the pathway of holiness. Its 
every act is a link to the living God, a surrender 
of the being for God's will, for God Himself to 
take possession. In the process of assimilation, 
slow but sure, by which the will of God, as the 



78 HOLY m C HEIST. 

meat of our souls, is taken up into our inmost 
being, our spiritual nature is strengthened, is 
spiritualized, growing up into an holy temple in 
which God can reveal Himself and take up His 
abode. 

Let every believer study to realize this. When 
God sanctified the seventh day as His period of 
making holy, He taught us that He could not do 
it at once. The revelation and communication of 
holiness must be gradual, as man is prepared to 
receive it. God's sanctifying work with each of 
us, as with the race, needs time. The time it 
needs and seeks is the life of daily, hourly 
obedience. All that is spent in self-will, and not 
in the living relation to the Lord, is lost. But 
when the heart seeks day by day to hearken to 
the voice and to obey it, the Holy One Himself 
watches over His words to fulfil them : "Ye shall 
be unto me an holy nation." In a way of which 
the soul beforehand can have but little concep- 
tion, God will overshadow and make His abode in 
the obedient heart. The habit of always listening 
for the voice and obeying it will only be the 
building of the temple : the Living God Himself, 
the Holy One, will come to take up His abode. 
The glory of the Lord will fill the house, and the 
promise be made true, " I will sanctify it by my 
glory." 



HOLINESS AND OBEDIENCE. 79 

'^ I brought you unto myself; if ye will obey my 
voice in deed, ye shall be unto me an holy nation." 
Seekers after holiness ! God has brought you to 
Himself. And now His voice speaks to you all 
the thoughts of His heart, that as you take them 
in, and make them your own, and make His will 
your own by living and doing it, you may enter 
into the most complete union with Himself, the 
union of will as well as of life, and so become a 
holy people unto Him. Let obedience, the listen- 
ing to and the doing the will of God, be the joy 
and the glory of your life ; it will give you access 
unto the Holiness of God. 

Be holy, as I AM HOLY. 



O my God ! Thou hast redeemed me for Thy- 
self, that Thou mightest have me wholly as Thine 
own, possessing, filling my inmost being with Thy 
own likeness. Thy perfect will, and the glory of 
Thy Holiness. And Thou seekest to train me, in 
' the power of a free and loving will, to take Thy 
will and make it my own, that in the very centre of 
my being I may have Thine own perfection dwell- 
ing in me. And in Thy words Thou revealest 
Thy will, that as I accept and keep them I may 



80 HOLT IN CHBIST. 

master their Divine contents, and will all that 
Thou wiliest. 

O my God ! let me live day by day in such fellow- 
ship with Thee, that T may indeed in everything 
hear Thy voice, the living voice of the living 
God speaking to me. Let the Holy Spirit, the 
Spirit of Thy Holiness, be to me Thy voice 
guiding me in the path of simple, childlike obedi- 
ence. I do bless Thee that I have seen that 
Christ, in whom I am holy, was the obedient one, 
that in obedience He sanctified Himself to be- 
come my sanctification, and that abiding in Him, 
Thy obedient, holy Child, is abiding in Thy will 
as once done by Him, and now to be done by me. 
O my God ! I will indeed obey Thy will : make 
Thou me one of Thy holy nation, a peculiar 
treasure above all people. Amen. 

1. ** He became obedient unto death." " Though He was a 
Son, yet He learned obedience by the things which He suffered/' 
" I come to do Thy will." *' In which will we are sanctified." 
Christ's example teaches us that obedience is the only path to 
the Holiness or the glory of God. Be this your consecration: 
a surrender in everything to seek and do the will of God. 

2. We are " holy in Christ"— in this Christ who did the will 
of God and was obedient to the death. In Him it is we are ; 
in Him we are holy. His obedience is the soil in which we are 
planted, and must be rooted. ** It is my meat to do His will ; " 
obedience was the sustenance of His life ; in doing God's will 
He drew down Divine nourishment; it must be so with us too. 



HOimESS AND OBEDIENCE. 81 

3. As you study what it is to be and abide in Christ, as you 
rejoice you are in Him, always remember it is Christ wlio 
obeyed in whom God has planted you. 

4. If ever you feel perplexed about holiness, just yield your- 
self again to do God's will, and go and do it. It is ours to obey, 
it is God's to sanctify. 

5. Holy in Christ. Christ sanctified Himself by obedience, 
by doing the will of God, and in that will, as done by Him, we 
have been sanctified. In accepting that will as done by Him, 
in accepting Him^ I am holy. In accepting thai will of God, 
as to be done by me, I become holy. I am in him ; in every act 
of living obedience, I enter into living fellowship with Him,, 
and draw the power of His life into mine. 

6. Obedience depends upon hearing the voice. Do not 
imagine you know the will of God. Pray and wait for the in- 
ward teaching of the Spirit. 

6 



82 HOLT IN CHBIST. 



EIGHTH DAY. 



HOLY IN CHRIST. 
1bollne60 anD JnDwellln^t 

"And let them make me a holy placCy that I may dwell 
among them." — Ex. xxv. 8. 

'* And the tent shall be sanctified by my glory, and I will 
dwell among the children of Israel, and will be their God." — 
Ex, xxix. 43, 45. 

THE Presence of God makes holy, even when 
it descends but for a little while, as at Horeb, 
in the burning bush. How much more must that 
Presence make holy the place where it dwells, 
where it fixes its permanent abode! So much is 
this the case, that the place where God dwells 
came to be called the holy place, ^'the holy 
place of the habitation of the Most High." All 
around where God dwelt was holy : the holy city, 
the mountain of God's Holiness, His holy house, 
till we come within the veil, to the most holy 
place, the holy of holies. It is as the indwelling 
God that He sanctifies His house, that He reveals 



HOLINESS AND INDWELLING. 83 

Himself as the Holy One in Israel, that He makes 
us holy too. 

Because God is holy, the house in which He 
dwells is holy too. This is the only attribute of 
God which He can communicate to His house; 
but this one He can and does communicate. 
Among men there is a very close link between the 
character of a house and its occupants. When 
there is no obstacle to prevent it, the house unin- 
tentionally reflects the master's likeness. Holi- 
ness expresses not so much an attribute as the 
very being of God in His infinite perfection, and 
His house testifies to this one truth, that He is 
holy, that where He dwells He must have holi- 
ness, that His indwelling makes holy. In His first 
command to His people to build Him a holy 
place, God distinctly said that it was that He 
might dwell among them: the dwelling in the 
house was to be the shadowing forth of His dwell- 
ing in the midst of His people. The house with 
its holiness thus leads us on to the holiness of 
His dwelling among His redeemed ones. 

The holy place, the habitation of God's Holi- 
ness, was the centre of all God's work in making 
Israel holy. Everything connected with it was 
holy. The altar, the priests, the sacrifices, the oil, 
the bread, the vessels, all were holy, because they 
belonged to God. From the house there issued the 



84 HOLT IJSr CUBIST. 

twofold voice — God's call to be holy, God's promise 
to make holy. God's claim was manifested in the 
demand for cleansing, for atonement, for holiness, 
in all who were to draw near, whether as priests 
or worshippers. And God's promise shone forth 
from His house in the provision for making holy, 
in the sanctifying power of the altar, of the blood 
and the oil. The house embodied the two sides 
that are united in holiness, the repelling and the 
attracting, the condemning and the saving. Now 
by keeping the people at a distance, then by in- 
viting and bringing them nigh, God's house was 
the great symbol of His own Holiness. He had 
come nigh even to dwell among them ; and yet 
they might not come nigh, they might never enter 
the secret place of His presence. 

All these things are written on our behalf It 
is as the Indwelling One that God is the sanctifier 
of His People still : the Indwelling Presence alone 
makes us holy. This comes out with special 
clearness if we note how, the nearer the Presence 
was, the greater the degree of holiness. Because 
God dwelt among them, the camp was holy : all 
uncleanness was to be removed from it. But the 
holiness of the court of the tabernacle was greater : 
uncleanness which did not exclude from the 
camp would not be tolerated there. Then the 
holy place was still holier, because still nearer 



HOLINESS AND INDWELLING. 85 

God. And the inner sanctuary, where the Pres- 
ence dwelt on the mercy-seat, was the Holiest 
of All was most holy. The principle still 
holds good: holiness is measured by nearness 
to God ; the more of His Presence, the more of 
true holiness; perfect indwelling will be perfect 
holiness. There is none holy but the Lord ; 
there is no holiness but in Him. He cannot part 
with somewhat of His holiness, and give it to us 
apart from Himself; we have only so much of 
holiness as we have of God Himself. And to 
have Himself truly and fully, we must have Him 
as the Indwelling One. And His indwelling in a 
house or locality, without life or spirit, is only a 
faint shadow of the true indwelling as the Living 
One, when He enters into and penetrates our very 
being, and fills us, our very selves, with His own 
life. 

There is no union so intimate, so real, so per- 
fect, as that of an indwelling life. Think of the 
life that circulates through a large and fruitful 
tree. How it penetrates and fills every portion ; 
how inseparably it unites the whole as long as it 
really is to exist ! — in wood and leaf, in flower and 
fruit, everywhere the indwelling life flows and 
fills. This life is the life of nature, the life of the 
Spirit of God which dwells in nature. It is the 
same life that animates our bodies, the spirit of 



86 HOLT IJSr CUBIST. 

nature pervading every portion of them with the 
power of sensibility and action. 

Not less intimate, yea rather, far more wonder- 
ful and real, is the indwelling of the Spirit of the 
New Life, through whom God dwells in the heart 
of the believer. And it is as this indwelling be- 
comes a matter of conscious longing and faith, 
that the soul obeys the command, '' Let them make 
me a holy place, that I may dwell among them," 
and experiences the truth of the promise, "The 
tent shall be sanctified by my glory, and I will 
dwell among the children of Israel." 

It was as the Indwelling One that God re- 
vealed Himself in the Son, whom He sanctified 
and sent into the world. More than once our 
Lord insisted upon it, " Believe me, that I am in 
the Father and the Father in me ; the Father abid- 
ing in me doeth the works." It is specially as the 
temple of God that believers are more than once 
called holy in the New Testament: " The temple 
of God is hol}\ which temple ye are." " Your body 
is a temple of the Holy Spirit." "' All the building 
groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord," It is 
— we shall later on learn to understand this better 
— just because it is through the Spirit that the 
heart is prepared for the indwelling, and the in- 
dwelling effected and maintained, that the Spirit 
so peculiarly takes the attribute of Holy. The 



HOLINESS AND mDWELLING. 87 

Indwelling Spirit is the Holy Spirit. The measure 
of His indwelling, or rather of His revealing the 
Indwelling Christ, is the measure of holiness. 

We have seen what the various degrees of near- 
ness to God's Presence in Israel were. They are 
still to be found. You have Christians who 
dwell in the camp, but know little of drawing nigh 
to the Holy One. Then you have outer court 
Christians : they long for pardon and peace, they 
come ever again to the altar of atonement; but 
they know little of true nearness or holiness; of 
their privilege as priests to enter the holy place. 
Others there are who have learnt that this is their 
calling, and long to draw near, and yet hardly 
understand the boldness they have to enter into 
the Holiest of all, and to dwell there. Blessed 
they to whom this, the secret of the Lord, has 
been revealed. They know what the rent veil 
means, and the access into the immediate Presence. 
The veil hath been taken away from their hearts : 
they have found the secret of true holiness in the 
Indwelling of the Holy One, the God who is holy 
and makes holy. 

Believer ! the God who calls you to holiness is 
the God of the Indwelling Life. The tabernacle 
typifies it, the Son reveals it, the Spirit communi- 
cates it, the eternal glory will fully manifest it. 
And you may experience it. It is your calling as 



88 HOLY IN CHRIST. 

a believer to be God's Holy Temple. Oh, do but 
yield yourself to His full indwelling ! seek not 
holiness in the first place in what you are or do ; 
seek it in God. Seek it not even as a gift from God, 
«eek it in God Himself, in His indwelling Presence. 
Worship Him in the beauty of holiness, as He 
dwells in the high and holy place. And as you 
worship, listen to His voice : " Thus saith the high 
and lofty One, that inhabiteth eternity, whose 
name is Holy : I dwell in the high and holy 
place, with him also that is of a contrite and humble 
spirit." It is as the Spirit strengthens us mightily 
in the inward man, so that Christ dwells in our 
heart by faith, and the Father comes and makes 
with Him His abode in us, that we are truly holy. 
Oh, let us but, in true, true-hearted consecration, 
yield ourselves to be, as distinctly as was the 
tabernacle or the temple, given up entirely to be 
the dwelling of the Most High, the habitation of 
His Holiness. A house filled with the glory of 
God, a heart filled with all the fulness of 
God, is God's promise, is oar portion. Let 
us in faith claim and accept and hold fast the 
blessing: Christ, the Holy One of God, will in 
His Father's Name, enter and take possession. 
Then faith wdll bring the solution of all our diffi- 
culties, the victory over all our failures, the ful- 
filment of all our desires : " The tent, the heart, 



HOLIlSfESS AND INDWELLING. 89 

shall be sanctified by my glory ; and I will dwell 
among them." The open secret of true holiness, 
the secret of the joy unspeakable, is Christ dwell- 
ing in the heart by faith. 

Be holy, as I AM HOLY. 



We bow our knees to the Father of our Lord 
Jesus, that He would grant unto us, according to 
the riches of His glory, what He Himself has 
taught us to ask for. We ask nothing less than 
this, that Christ may dwell in our hearts by faith. 
We long for that most blessed, permanent, con- 
scious indwelling of the Lord Jesus in the heart, 
which He so distinctly promised as the fruit of 
the Holy Spirit's coming. Father! we ask for 
what He meant when He spake of the loving, 
obedient disciple : " I will come and manifest my- 
self to him. We w^ill come and take up our abode 
with him." Oh, grant unto us this indwelling of 
Christ in the heart by faith ! 

And for this, we beseech Thee, grant us to be 
strengthened wdth might by Thy Spirit in the 
inner man. O Most Mighty God ! let the spirit of 
Thy Divine Power work mightily within us, re- 
newing our mind, and will, and affections, so that 
the heart be all prepared and furnished as a 



90 HOLY m CHRIST. 

temple, as a home, for Jesus. Let that Blessed 
Spirit strengthen us to the faith that receives the 
Blessed Saviour and His indwelling Presence. 

Most Gracious Father ! hear our cry. We do 
bow our knee to Thee. We plead the riches of 
Thy glory. We praise Thee who art mighty to 
do above what we can ask or think. We wait on 
Thee, our Father: oh, grant us a mighty 
strengthening by the Spirit in the inner man, 
that this bliss may be ours in its full blessedness, 
our Lord Jesus dwelling in the heart. 

We ask it in His Name. Amen. 



1. God's dwelling in the midst of Israel was the great central 
fact to which all the commands concerning holiness were but 
preparatory and subordinate. So the work of the Holy Spirit 
also culminates in the personal indwelling of Christ. John 
xiv. 21, 23. Eph. iii. 16, 17. Aim at this and expect it. 

2. The tabernacle with its three divisions was, as of other 
spiritual truths, so the image of man's threefold nature. Our 
spirit is the Holiest of all, where God is meant to dwell, where 
the Holy Spirit is given. The life of the soul, with its powers 
of feeling, knowing, and willing, is the holy place. And the 
outer life of the body, of conduct and action, is the outer court. 
Begin by believing that the Spirit dwells in the inmost snnc- 
tuary, where His workings are secret and hidden. Honor Hira 
by trusting Him to work, by yielding to Him in silent worsh.ip 
before God. From within He will take possession of thought 
and will ; He will even fill the outer court, the body, with the 
Holiness of God. "The God of peace Himself sanctify you 
wholly; and may your spirit, and soul, and body, be preserved 



HOLIJSESS AND INDWELLING. 91 

entire, without blame. Faithful is He which calleth you, who 
will also do it/' 

3. God's indwelling was within the veil, in the unseen, the 
secret place. Faith knew it, and served Him with holy fear. 
Our faith knows that God the Holy Spirit has His abode in the 
hidden place of our inner life. Set open your inmost being to 
Him ; bow in lowly reverence before the Holy One as you 
yield yourself to His working. Holiness is the presence of the 
Indwelling One. 



92 HOLY IN CHBIST. 



KINTH DAY. 



HOLY IN CHRIST. 
Iboltneaa anD /llbeDlation^ 

"Aud thou shalt make a plate of pure gold, and grave upon 
it, Holiness to the Lokd. And it shall be upon Aaron^s 
forehead, that Aaron may bear the iniquity of the holy things, 
which the children of Israel shall hallow in all their holy gifts; 
and it shall always be upon his forehead, that they may be ac- 
cepted before the Lord.^' — Ex. xxviii. 36, 38. 

GOD'S house was to be the dwelling-place of 
His Holiness, the place where He was to re- 
veal Himself ; as the Holy One, not to be ap- 
proached but with fear and trembling; as the 
Holy -making One, drawing to Himself all who 
would be made partakers of His Holiness. Of 
the revelation of His Holy and Holy-making 
Presence, the centre is found in the person of the 
high priest, in his double capacity of representing 
God with man, and man with God. He is the 
embodiment of the Divine Holiness in human 
form, and of human holiness as a Divine gift, as 



HOLINESS AND MEDIATION 93 

far as the dispensation of symbol and shadow 
could offer and express it. In him God came 
near to sanctify and bless the people. In him the 
people came their very nearest to God. And yet 
the very Day of Atonement, in which he might 
enter into the Most Holy, was but the proof of 
how unholy man was, and how unfit to abide in 
God's Presence. In himself a proof of Israel's 
unholiness, he yet was a type and picture of the 
coming Saviour, our blessed Lord Jesus, a won- 
drous exhibition of the way in which hereafter 
the holiness of God should become the portion 
of His people. 

Among the many points in which the high 
priest typified Christ as our sanctification, there is^ 
perhaps, none more suggestive or beautiful than 
the holy crown he wore on his forehead. Every- 
thing about him was to holy. His garments were 
holy garments. But there was to be one thing in 
which this holiness reached its fullest manifesta- 
tion. On his forehead he was always to wear a 
plate of gold, with the words engraved on it. 
Holiness to the Lord. Every one was to read 
there that the whole object of his existence, the 
one thing he lived for, was, to be the embodiment 
and the bearer of the Divine holiness, the chosen 
one through whom God's holiness might flow out 
in blessing upon the people. 



94 HOLT IJSr CHRIST. 

The way in which the blessing of the holy 
crown was to act was a most remarkable one. In 
bearing Holiness to the Lord on his forehead, 
] he is, we read, '' to bear the iniquity of the holy 
things which the children of Israel hallow ; that 
they may be accepted before the Lord." For 
every sin some sacrifice or way of atonement had 
been devised. But how about the sin that cleaves 
to the very sacrifice and religious service itself? 
" Thou desirest truth in the inward parts." How 
painfully the worshipper might be oppressed by 
the consciousness that his penitence, his faith, his 
love, his obedience, his consecration, were all 
imperfect and defiled ! For this need, too, of the 
worshipper, God had provided. The holiness of 
the high priest covered the sin and the unholiness 
of his holy things. The holy crown was God's 
pledge that the holiness of the high priest ren- 
dered the worshipper acceptable. If he was un- 
holy, there was one among his brethren who was 
holy, who had a holiness that could avail for 
him too, a holiness he could trust in. He could 
look to the high priest not only to effect atone- 
ment by his blood-sprinkling, but in his person to 
secure a holiness too that made him and his gifts 
most acceptable. In the consciousness of personal 
unholiness he might rejoice in a mediator, in the 



HOLINESS AND MEDIATION 95 

holiness of Another than himself, the priest whom 
God had provided. 

Have we not here a most precious lesson, lead- 
ing us a step farther on in the way of holiness ? 
To our question, How God makes holy, we have 
the Divine answer : Through a man w^hom the 
Divine Holiness has chosen to rest upon, and 
whose holiness belongs to us, as His brethren, the 
very members of His own body. Through a 
holiness which is of such efficacy, that the very 
sins of our holy things disappear, and we can 
enter the Holy Presence with the assurance of be- 
ing altogether well-pleasing. 

And is not just this the lesson that many earnest 
seekers after holiness need ? They know all that 
the Word teaches of the blessed Atonement, and 
the full pardon it has brought. They believe in 
the Father's wonderful love, and what He is 
ready to do for them. And yet, when they hear 
of the childlike simplicity, the assurance of faith, 
the loving" obedience, and the blessed surrender 
with which the Father expects them to come and 
receive the blessing, their heart fails for fear. It 
is as if the blessing were all beyond their reach. 
What avails that the Holy One is said to come so 
nigh ? their unholiness renders them incapable of 
claiming or grasping the Presence that offers itself 
to them. Just see how the Holy One here reveals 



96 HOLY IN CHRIST. 

His way of making holy, and preparing for the 
fellowship of His Holiness. In His Elect One as 
Mediator, holiness is prepared and treasured up 
enough for all who come through Him. As I 
bow to pray or worship, and feel how much there 
is still wanting of that humility, and fervency, 
and faith, that God has a right to demand, I uiay 
look up to the High Priest in His Holiness, to 
the holy crown upon His forehead, and believe 
that the iniquity of my holy things is borne and 
taken away. I may, with all my deficiency and 
unworthiness, know most assuredly that my 
prayer is acceptable, a sweet-smelling savor. I 
may look up to the Holy One to see Him smiling 
on me, for the sake of His Anointed One. " The 
holy crown shall always be on His forehead, that 
they may be accepted before the Lord." It is the 
blessed truth of Substitution — One for all — of 
Mediatorship ; God's way of making us holy. The 
sacrifice of the worshipping Israelite is holy and 
acceptable in virtue of the holiness of Another. 

The Old Testament shadow can never adequately 
set forth the New Testament reality with its ful- 
ness of grace and truth. As we proceed in our 
study, we shall find that the holiness of Jesus 
our sanctification is not only imputed but im- 
parted, because we are in Him ; the new man we 
have put on is created in true holiness. We are 



HOLINESS AND MEDIATION 97 

not only counted holy ; we are holy, we have re- 
ceived a new holy nature in Christ Jesus. " He 
that sanctifieth and they who are sanctified are 
all oj One; therefore He is not ashamed to call 
them brethren." It is our living union with 
Jesus, God's Holy One, that has given us the new 
and holy nature, and with that a claim and a 
share in all the holiness there is in Jesus. And 
so, as often as we are conscious of how unholy we 
are, we have only to come under the covering of 
the Holiness of Jesus, to enjoy the full assurance 
that we and our gifts are most acceptable. How- 
ever great be the weakness of our faith, the short- 
coming in our desire for God's glory, the lack in 
our love or zeal, as we see Jesus, with Holiness to 
the Lord on His forehead, we lift up our faces to 
receive the Divine smile of full approval and per- 
fect acceptance. 

This is God's way of making holy. Not only 
with the holy place, as we have seen, but with the 
holy persons too. He begins with a centre, and 
from that in ever-widening circle makes holy. 
And that this Divine method will be crowned 
with success we may be sure. In the Word we 
find a most remarkable illustration of the extent 
to which it will be realized. We find the words 
on the holy crown once again in the Old Testa- 
ment at its close. In the day of the Lord, '' there 
7 



98 HOLY IN CHBIST. 

shall be upon the bells of the horses, Holiness to 
THE Lord." The high priest's motto shall then have 
become the watchword of daily life; every article 
of beauty or of service shall be holy too ; from 
the head it shall have extended to the skirts of 
ti^e garments. Let us begin with realizing the 
Holiness of Jesus in its power to cover the in- 
iquity of our holy things ; let us make proof of it, 
and no longer suffer our unworthiness to keep us 
back or make us doubt ; let us believe that we 
and our holy things are acceptable, because in 
Christ holy to the Lord ; let us live in this con- 
sciousness of acceptance, and enter into fellow- 
ship with the Holy One. As we enter in and 
abide in the holiness of Jesus, it will enter in and 
abide in us. It will take possession and spread 
its conquering power through our whole life, until 
with us too upon everything that belongs to us 
the word shall shine, Holiness to the Lord. 
And we shall again find how God's way of holi- 
ness is ever from a centre, here the centre of our 
renewed nature, throughout the whole circumfer- 
ence of our being, to make His Holiness prove its 
power. Let us but dwell under the covering of 
the Holiness of Jesus, as He takes away the 
iniquity of our holy things, He will make us and 
our life holy to the Lord. 

Be ye holy, for I am holy. 



HOLINESS AND MEDIATION. 99 

my God and Father ! my soul doth bless 
Thee for this wondrous revelation of what Thy 
way and Thy grace is with those whom Thou hast 
called " Holy in Christ." Thou knowest, O Lord, 
how continually our hearts have limited our 
acceptance with Thee by our attainments, and 
conscious shortcoming has wrought condemna- 
tion. We knew too little how, in the Holiness of 
Him who makes us holy, there is a Divinely infin- 
ite efficacy to cover our iniquities, and give us the 
assurance of perfect acceptance. Blessed Father! 
open our eyes to see, and our hearts to understand 
this holy crown of our blessed Jesus, with its 
wondrous and most blessed, Holiness to the 
Lord. 

And when our hearts condemn us, because our 
prayers are so little consciously according to the 
will or to the glory of God, or truly in the name 
of Jesus, most Holy Father, be pleased by Thy 
Spirit to show us how bright the smile and how 
hearty the welcome is we still have with Thee. 
Teach us to come in the Holiness of our High 
Priest, and enter into Thine, until it take posses- 
sion of us, and permeate our whole being, and all 
that is in us be holy to the Lord. Amen. 

1. Holiness is not something I can see or admire in myself: 
it is covering myself, losing myself, in the Holiness of Jesus- 
How wonderfully this is typified in Aaron and the holy crown. 



100 HOLY IJSr CHRIST, 

And the more I see and have apprehended of the Holiness of 
Jesus, the less shall I see or seek of holiness iu myself. 

2. He will make me holy ; my tempers and dispositions will 
be renewed ; my heart and mind cleansed and sanctified ; holi- 
ness will be a new nature ; and yet there will be all along the 
consciousness, humbling and yet full of joy : it is not I ; Christ 
liveth in me. 

3. Let us lie very low and tender before God, that the Holy 
Spirit may reveal to us what it is to be holy in the Holiness of 
Another, in the Holiness of Jesus, that is, in the Holiness of 
God. 

4. Do not trouble or weary too much to grasp this with the 
intellect. Just believe it, and look in simplicity and trust to 
Jesus to make it all right for yon. 

5. Holy in Christ. In childlike faith I take Christ's holi- 
ness afresh as my covering before God. In loving obedience I 
take it into my will and life. I trust and I follow Jesus: this 
is the path of holiness. 

6. If we gather up the lessons we have found in the Word 
from Paradise downward, we see that the elements of holiness 
in us are these, each corresponding to sOme special aspect of 
God's holiness : deep Restfulness (ch. 3), humble Reverence 
(ch. 4), entire Surrender (ch. 5), joyful Adoration (ch. 6), sim- 
ple Obedience (ch. 7). These all prepare for the Divine In- 
dwelling (ch. 8), and this again we have through the Abiding 
in Jesus with the Crown of Holiness on His head. 



HOLINESS AND SEPARATION 101 



TENTH DAY. 



HOLY IN CHRIST. 
1bolfne60 anD Separatfom 

"I am the Lord your God, which have separated you from 
other people. And ye shall be holy unto me, for I the Lord am 
holy aud have separated you from other people that ye should 
be Mine:'— Lev. xx. 24, 26. 

"Until the days be fulfilled, in the which he separateth him- 
self unto the Lord, he shall be holy. . . . All the days of his 
separation he is holy unto the Lord." — Num. vi. 5, 8. 

''Wherefore Jesus also, that He might sanctify the people 
through His own blood, suffered without the gate. Let us 
therefore go forth unto Him without the camp, bearing His re- 
proach." — Heb. xiii. 12, 13. 

SEPARATION is not holiness, but is the way 
to it. Though there can be no holiness with- 
out separation, there can be separation that does 
not lead to holiness. It is of deep importance to 
understand both the difference and the connection, 
that we may be kept from the right-hand error of 
counting separation alone as holiness, as well as 
the left-hand error of seeking holiness without 
separation. 



102 HOLY m CHRIST. 

The Hebrew word for holiness possibly comes 
from a root that means to separate. But where 
we have in our translation " separate " or " sever " 
or "set apart," we have quite different words.^ 
The word for holy is used exclusively to express 
that special idea. And though the idea of holy 
always includes that of separation, it is itself 
something mfinitely higher. It is of great im- 
portance to understand this well, because the be- 
ing set apart to God, the surrender to His claim, 
the devotion or consecration to His service, is 
often spoken of as if this constituted holiness. 
We cannot too earnestly press the thought that 
this is only the beginning, the presupposition: 
holiness itself is infinitely more; not what I am, 
or do, or give, is holiness, but what God is, and 
gives, and does to me. It is God's taking posses- 
sion of me that makes me holy ; it is the Presence 
and the glory of God that really makes holy. A 
careful study of God's words to Israel will make 
this clear to us. Eight times we find the expres- 
sion in Leviticus. " Ye shall be holy, for I am 
holy." Holiness is the highest attribute of God, 
expressive not only of His relation to Israel, but 
of His very being and nature, His infinite moral 
perfection. And though it is by very slow and 
gradual steps that He can teach the carnal 
1 See Note B. 



H0LINE88 AND SEPARATION. 103 

darkened mind of man what this means, yet from 
the very commencement He tells His people that 
His purpose is that they should be like Himself — 
holy because and as He is holy. To tell me that 
God separates men for Himself to be His, even as 
He gives Himself to be theirs, tells me of a rela- 
tion that exists, but tells me nothing of the real 
nature of this Holy Being, or of the essential 
worth of the holiness He will communicate to me. 
Separation is only the setting apart and taking 
possession of the vessel to be cleansed and used ; 
it is the filling of it with the precious contents we 
entrust to it that gives it its real value. Holiness 
is the Divine filling without which the separation 
leaves us empty. Separation is not holiness. 

But separation is essential to holiness. '' I have 
separated you from other people, and ye shall be 
holy.'- Until I have chosen out and separated a 
vessel from those around it, and, if need be, 
cleansed it, I cannot fill or use it. I must have 
it in my hand, full and exclusive command of it 
for the time being, or I will not pour into it the 
precious milk or wine. And just so God separated 
His people when He brought them up out of 
Egypt, separated them unto Himself when He gave 
them His covenant and His law, that He might 
have them under His control and power, to w^ork 
out His purpose of making them holy. This He 



104 HOLY IN CHRIST 

could not do until He had them apart, and had 
wakened in them the consciousness that they were 
His peculiar people, wholly and only His, until 
He had so taught them also to separate themselves 
to Him. Separation is essential to holiness. 

The institution of the Nazarite will confirm this, 
and will also bring out very clearly what separa- 
tion means. Israel was meant to be a holy nation. 
Its holiness was specially typified in its priests. 
With regard to the individual Israelite, we no- 
where read in the books of Moses of his being 
holy. But there were ordinances through which 
the Israelite, who would fain prove his desire to 
be entirely holy, could do so. He might separate 
himself from the ordinary life of the nation 
around him, and live the life of a Nazarite, a 
separated one. This separation was accepted, in 
those days of shadow and type, as holiness. " All 
the days of his separation he is holy unto the 
Lord.'' 

The separation consisted specially in three 
things — temperance, in abstinence from the fruit 
of the vine ; humiliation, in not cutting or shav- 
ing his hair (^' it is a shame for a man if he have 
long hair ") ; self-sacrifice, in not defiling himself 
for even father or mother, on their death. What 
we must specially note is that the separation was 
not from things unlawful, but things lawful. 



HOLINESS AND SEPARATION 105 

There was nothing sinful in itself in Abraham 
living in his father's house, or in Israel dwelling 
in Egypt. It is in giving up, not only what 
can be proved to be sin, but all that may hinder 
the full intensity of our surrender into God's 
hands to make us holy, that the spirit of separa- 
tion is manifested. 

Let us learn the lessons this truth suggests. 
We must know the need for separation. It is no 
arbitrary demand of God, but has its ground in 
the very nature of things. To separate a thing is 
to set it free for one special use or purpose, that it 
may witli undivided power fulfil the will of him 
who chose it, and so realize its destiny. It is the 
principle that lies at the root of all division of 
labor ; complete separation to one branch of study 
or labor is the way to success and perfection. I 
have before me an oak forest with the trees all 
shooting up straight and close to each other. On 
the outskirts there is one tree separated from his 
fellows ; its heavy trunk and wide-spreading 
branches prove how its being separated, and hav- 
ing a large piece of ground separated to its own 
use, over which roots and branches can spread, is 
the secret of growth and greatness. Our human 
powers are limited ; if God is to take full posses- 
sion, if we are fully to enjoy Him, separation to 
Him is nothing but the simple, natural, indispen- 



106 HOLY IN CHRIST. 

sable requisite. God wants us all to Himself, that 
He may give Himself all to us. 

We must know the purpose of separation. It is 
to be found in what God has said, ^' Ye shall be 
holy unto me, for I the Lord am holy, and have 
separated you from the people, that ye should be 
Mine." God has separated us for Himself in the 
deepest sense of the word ; that He miglit enter 
into us, and show forth Himself in us. His holi- 
ness is the sum and the centre of all His perfec- 
tions; it is that He may make us holy like Him- 
self that He has separated us. Separation never 
has any value in itself; it may become most 
wrong or hurtful ; everything depends upon the 
object proposed. It is as God gets and takes full 
possession of us, as the eternal life in Christ has 
the mastery of our whole being, as the Holy Spirit 
flows fully and freely through us, so that we 
dwell in God, and God in us, that separation will 
be, not a thing of ordinances and observances, but 
a spiritual reality. And it is as this purpose of 
God is seen and accepted and followed after, that 
difficult questions as to what we must be sepa- 
rated from, and how much sacrifice separation de- 
mands, will find an easy answer. God separates 
from all that does not lead us into His holiness 
and fellowship. 

We need, above all, to know the power of separa- 



HOLINESS AND SEPARATION. 107 

tion, the power that leads us into it in the spirit 
of desire and of joy, of liberty and of love. The 
great separating word in human language is the 
word Mine. In this we have the great spring of 
effort and of happiness : in the child with its toys, 
in labor with its gains and rewards, in the patriot 
who dies for his country, it is this Mine that lays 
its hand on what it sets apart from all else. It is 
the great word that love uses. Be it the child 
that says to its mother, My own mamma, and 
calls forth the response. My own child ; the bride- 
groom who draws the daughter from her beloved 
home and parents to become his ; or the Holy God 
who speaks : " I have separated you from the 
people, that ye should be Mine ; " it is always with 
that Mine that love exerts its mighty power, and 
draws from all else to itself. God Himself knows 
no mightier argument, can put forth no more 
powerful attraction than this, " that ye should be 
Mine.''' And the power of separation will come to 
us, and work in us, just as we yield ourselves to 
study and realize that holy purpose, to listen to 
and appropriate that wondrous Mine^ to be appre- 
hended and possessed of that Almighty Love. 

Let us study step by step the wondrous path in 
which Divine Love does its separating work. In 
redemption it prepares the way. Israel is sepa- 
rated from Egypt by the blood of the Lamb and 



108 HOLY IN CHRIST. 

the guiding pillar of fire. In its command, 
" Come out and be separate," it wakens man to 
action ; in its promise, " I will be your God," it 
stirs desire and strengthens faith. In all the holy 
saints and servants of God, and at last in Him 
who was holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from 
sinners, it points the way. In the power of the 
Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Holiness, it seals the 
separation by the Presence of the Indwelling God. 
This is indeed the power of separation. The sepa- 
rating "power of the Presence of God ; this it is we 
need to know. " Wherein now shall it be known 
that I have found grace in Thy sight, I and Thy 
people ? " said Moses : " is it not in that Thou goest 
with us ? so shall we be separated, I and Thy 
people, from all the people that are upon the face 
of the earth." It is the consciousness of God's 
Indwelling Presence, making and keeping us His 
very own, that works the true separateness from 
the world and its spirit, from ourselves and our 
own will. And it is as this separation is accepted 
and prized and persevered in by us, that the holi- 
ness of God will enter in and take possession. 
And we shall realize that to be the Lord's prop- 
erty, a people of His own, is infinitely more than 
merely to be accounted or acknowledged as His, 
that it means nothing less than that God, in the 
power and indwelling of the Holy Ghost, fills our 



HOLINESS AND SEPABATION, 10^ 

being, our affections, and our will with His own 
life and holiness. He separates us for Himself, 
and sanctifies us to be His dwelling. He comes 
Himself to take personal possession by the in- 
dwelling of Christ in the heart. And we are then 
truly separate, and kept separate, by the presence 
of God within us. 

Be ye holy, for I am holy. 



my God ! who hast separated me for Thy- 
self, I beseech Thee, by Thy mighty power, to 
make this Divine separation deed and truth to 
me. May within, in the depths of my own spirit, 
and without, in all my intercourse, the crown of 
separation of my God be upon me. 

1 pray Thee especially, my God, to perfect in 
power the separation from self ! Let Thy Pres- 
ence in the indwelling of my Lord Jesus be the 
power that banishes self from the throne. I have 
turned from it with abhorrence ; oh, my Father, 
reveal Thy Son fully in me! it is His enthrone- 
ment in my heart can keep me as Thy own, as 
Himself takes the place of myself. 

And give me grace. Lord, in my outward life to 
wait for a Divine wisdom, that I may know to 
witness, for Thy glory and for what Thy people 



110 HOLY IlSr CHRIST. 

need, to the blessedness of an entire giving up of 
everything for God, a separation that holds back 
nothing, to be His and His alone. 

Holy Lord God ! visit Thy people. Oh, with- 
draw Thou them from the world and conformity 
to it. Separate, Lord, separate Thine own for 
Thyself. Separate, Lord^ the wheat from the 
chaff; separate, as by fire, the gold from the 
dross ; that it may be seen who are the Lord's, 
even His holy ones. Amen. 

1. Love separates eflfectuaUy. With what jealousy a husband 
claims his wife, a mother her children, a miser his possessions! 
Pray that the Holy Spirit may show how God brought you to 
Himself, that you should be His. "He is a holy God; He is 
a Jealous God/' God's love shed abroad in the heart makes 
separation easy. 

2. Death separates eflfectuaUy. If I reckon myself to be in- 
deed dead in Christ, I am separated from self by the power of 
Christ's death. Life separates still more mightily. As I say, 
*' Not I, but Christ liveth in me,'' I am lifted up out of the life 
of self. 

3. Separation must be manifest ; it is meant as a witness to 
others and ourselves ; it must find expression in the external, 
if internally it is to be real and strong. It is the characteristic 
of a symbolic action that it not merely expresses a feeling, but 
nourishes and strengthens the feeling to which it corresponds. 
When the soul enters the fellowship of God, it feels the need 
of external separation, sometimes even from what appears to 
others harmless. If animated by the spirit of lowly consecra- 
tion to God, the external may be a great strengthening of the 
true separateness. 



HOLINESS AND SEPABATION. Ill 

4. Separation to God and appropriation by Him go together. 
This has been the blessing that has come to martyrs, confessors, 
missionaries, — all who have given distinct expression to the 
forsaking all. 

5. Separation begins in love, and ends in love. The spirit 
of separation is the spirit of self-sacrifice, of surrender to the 
love of God ; the truly separate one will be the most loving and 
love- winning, given up to serve God and man. Is not what 
separates, what distinguishes Jesus from all others, His self- 
sacrificing love ? This is His separateness, in which we are to 
be made like Him. 

6. God's holiness is His separateness ; let us enter into His 
separateness from the world ; that will be our holiness. Unite 
thyself to God. Then art thou separate and holy. God sepa- 
rates for Himself, not by an act from without, but as His Will 
and Presence take possession of us. 



112 HOLY IN CHBI8T, 



ELEVENTH DAY. 



HOLY IN CHRIST. 
XTbe 1boli2 One ot JsraeL 

" I am the Lord that brought you up out of the land of 
Egypt, to be your God; ye shall therefore be holy, for 1 am 
holy. I the Lord which make you holy, am holy.^' — Lev. xi. 
45, xxi. 8. 

''I am the Lord Thy God, the Holy One of Israel, Thy 
Saviour. Thus saith the Lord, your Redeemer, the Holy One 
of Israel : I am the Lord, your Holy One, the Creator of 
Israel, your King." — Isa. xliii. 3, 14, 15. 

IN the book of Exodus we found God making 
provision for the Holiness of His people. In 
the holy times and holy places, holy persons, 
holy things, and holy services, He had taught 
His people that everything around Him, that all 
that would come near Him, must be holy. He 
would only dwell in the midst of holiness ; His 
people must be a holy people. But there is no 
direct mention of God Himself as holy. In the 
book of Leviticus we are led on a step further. 



THE HOLY ONE OF ISRAEL. 113 

Here first we have God speaking of His own 
holiness, and making it the plea for the holiness 
of His people, as well as its pledge and power. 
Without this the revelation of holiness were in- 
complete, and the call to holiness powerless. 
True holiness will come to us as we learn that 
God Himself alone is holy. It is He alone makes 
holy ; it is as we come to Himself, and in 
obedience and love are linked to Himself, that 
His Holiness can rest on us.^ 

From the books of Moses onwards we shall find 
that the name of God as holy is found but sel- 

1 " I am the Lord your God; ye shall therefore make holy 
yourselves, and he holyy for I am holyT Lev, xi. 44. 

'^ I am the Lord that bringeth you up out of the land of 
Egypt to be your God : ye shall therefore he holy, for I am 
holy" Lev. xi. 45. 

" Ye shall he holy^ for I the Lord your God am holy." Lev, 
xix. 2. 

^^Make holy yourselves therefore, and he ye holy, for I am the 
Lord your God ; ye shall keep my statutes and do them : I am 
the Lord which make you holy." Lev. xx. 7, 8. 

*' Ye shall he holy unto me, for I the Lord am holy, and have 
separated you from other people, that ye should be mine.'* 
Lev. XX. 26. 

" The priest shall be holy unto thee, for I the Lord which 
make you holy, am holy." Lev. xxi. 8. 

*' I will be hallowed among the children of Israel ; I am the 
Lord which make you holy." Lev. xxii. 32. 

** I am the Lord which make them holy J* Lev. xxi. 15, 23 1 
xxii. 9, 16. 
8 



114 HOLY IN CHRIST, 

dom in the inspired writings, until we come to 
Isaiah, the evangelist prophet. There it occurs 
twenty-six times, and has its true meaning opened 
up in the way in which it is linked with the name 
of Saviour and Redeemer. The sentiments of 
joy and trust and praise, with which a redeemed 
people would look upon their Deliverer, are 
all mentioned in connection with the name of 
the Holy One. "Cry aloud and shout, thou 
inhabitant of Zion, for great is the Holy One of 
Israel in the midst of thee." '' The poor among 
men shall rejoice in the Holy One of IsraeV^ 
''Thou shalt rejoice in the Lord, and shalt glory 
in the Holy One of IsraeV^ In Paradise we saw 
that God the Creator was God the Sanctifier, per- 
fecting the work of His hands. In Israel we saw 
that God the Redeemer was ever God the Sancti- 
fier, making holy the people He had chosen for 
Himself. Here in Isaiah we see how it is God the 
Sanctifier, the Holy One, who is to bring about 
the great redemption of the New Testament: as 
the Hoi}' One, He is the Redeemer. God redeems 
because He is holy, and loves to make holy : 
Holiness will be Redemption perfected. Redemp- 
tion and Holiness together are to be found in the 
personal relation to God. The key to the secret 
of holiness is offered to each believer in that 
word: "Thus saith the Lord, your Redeemer, 



THE HOLY ONE OF ISBAEL. 115 

the Holy One of Israel : I am the Lord, your 
Holy One." To come near, to know, to possess 
the Holy One, and be possessed of Him, is Holi- 
ness. 

If God's Holiness is thus the only hope for 
ours, it is right that we seek to know what that 
Holiness is. And though we may find it indeed 
to be something that passeth knowledge, it will 
not be in vain to gather up what has been revealed 
in the Word concerning it. Let us do so in the 
spirit of holy fear and worship, trusting to the 
Holy Spirit to be our teacher. 

And let us first notice how this Holiness of 
God, though it is often mentioned as one of the 
Divine attributes, can hardly be counted such, on 
a level with the others. The other attributes all 
refer to some special aspect or characteristic of the 
Divine Nature ; Holiness appears to express what 
is the very essence or perfection of the Divine 
Being Himself. None of the attributes can be 
predicated of all that belongs to God ; but Scrip- 
ture speaks of His Holy Name, His Holy Day, 
His Holy Habitation, His Holy Word. In the 
word Holy we have the nearest possible approach 
to a summary of all the Divine perfections, the 
description of what Divinity is. We speak of the 
other attributes as Divine perfections, but in this 
we have the only human expression for the Divine 



116 HOLT IN CHBIST. 

Perfection itself. It is for this reason that theolo- 
gians have found such difficulty in framing a 
definition that can express all the word means.^ 

The original Hebrew word, whether derived 
from a root signifying to separate, or another with 
the idea of shining, expressed the idea of some- 
thing distinguished from others, separate from 
them by superior excellence. God is separate 
and different from all that is created, keeps Him- 
self separate from all that is not God ; as the 
Holy One He maintains His Divine glory and 
perfection against whatever might interfere with 
it: ''There is none holy, but the Lord;" ''To 
whom will you liken me ? or shall I be equal ? 
saith the Holy One." As Holy, God is indeed 
the Incomparable One; Holiness is His alone; 
there is nothing like it in heaven or earth, except 
when He gives it. And so our holiness will con- 
sist, not in a human separation in which we 
attempt to imitate God's, — no, but in entering into 
His separateness ; belonging entirely to Him ; set 
apart by Him and for Himself. 

Closely connected with this is the idea of Exal- 
tation : '' Thus saith the High and Holy One, 
whose name is Holy." It was the Holy One who 
was seen sitting upon a throne high and lifted up, 

1 See Note C for some account of the different definitions 
that have been given. 



THE HOLY ONE OF ISEAEL, 117 

the object of the worship of the seraphim. In 
Psahn xcix. God's Holiness is specially spoken of 
in connection with His exaltation. For this 
reason, too, His Holiness is so often connected 
with His Glory and Majesty (see ''Sixth Day "). 
And here our holiness will be seen to be nothing 
but the poverty and humility which comes when 
**the loftiness of man is brought low, and the 
Lord alone is exalted." 

If we inquire more closely wherein the infinite 
excellence of this Separateness and Exaltation 
consists, we are led to think of the Divine Purity, 
and that not only in its negative aspect — as 
hatred of sin — but with the more positive element 
of perfect beauty. Because we are sinners, and 
the revelation of God's Holiness is in a world of 
sin, it is natural, it is right and meet, that the 
first, that the abiding impression of God's Holi- 
ness should be that of an Infinite Purity that 
cannot look upon sin, in whose Presence it be- 
comes the sinner to hide his face and tremble. 
The Righteousness of God, forbidding and con- 
demning and punishing sin, has its root in His 
Holiness, is one of its two elements — the devour- 
ing and destroying power of the consuming fire. 
^' God the Holy One is sanctified in righteous- 
ness " (Isa. V. 16) ; in righteousness the Holiness 
of the Holy One is maintained and revealed. 



118 HOLY m CUBIST. 

But Light not only discovers what is impure, that 
it may be purified, but is in itself a thing of infin- 
ite beauty. And so some of our holiest men have 
not hesitated to speak of God's Holiness as the 
infinite Pulchritude or Beauty of the Divine 
Being, the Perfect Purity and Beauty of that 
Light in which God dwelleth. And if the Holi- 
ness of God is to become ours, to rest upon us, 
and enter into us, there must be, without ceasing, 
the holy fear that trembles at the thought of griev- 
ing the infinite sensitiveness of this Holy One by 
our sins, and yet side by side, and in perfect har- 
mony with it, the deep longing to behold the 
Beauty of the Lord, an admiration of its Divine 
glory, and a joyful surrender to be His alone. 

We must go one siep further. When God says, 
" I am holy : I make holy,^^ we see that one of the 
chief elements of His Holiness is this, that it seeks 
to communicate itself, to make partaker of its 
own perfection and blessedness. This is nought 
but Love. In the wonderful revelation in Isaiah 
of what the Holy One is to His people, we must 
beware of misreading God's precious Word. It is 
not said, that though God is the Holy One, and 
hates sin, and ought to punish and destroy, that 
notwithstanding this He will save. By no means. 
But we are taught that as the Holy One, just be- 
cause He is the Holy One, who delights to make 



THE HOLT ONE OF ISRAEL, 119 

holy, He will be the Deliverer of His people. See 
Jlo8, xi. 9. It is Holiness above everything else 
that we are invited to look to, to trust in, to 
rejoice in. The Holy One is the Holy-making 
One: He redeems and saves that He may win 
our confidence for Himself, that He may draw us 
to Himself as the Holy One, that in the personal 
attachment to Himself we may learn to obey, to 
become of one mind with Him, to be holy as He 
is holy. 

The Divine Holiness is thus that infinite Per- 
fection of Divinity in which Righteousness and 
Love are in perfect harmony, out of which they 
proceed, and which together they reveal. It is. 
that Energy of the Divine life in the power of 
which God not only keeps Himself free from all 
creature weakness or sin, but unceasingly seeks to 
lift the creature into union with Himself and the 
full participation of His own purity and perfec- 
tion. The glory of God as God, as the God of 
Creation and Redemption, is His Holiness. It is 
in this that the Separateness and Exaltation of 
God, even above all thought of man, really con- 
sists. '' God is Light ; " in His infinite Purity He 
reveals all darkness, and yet has no fellowship 
with it. He judges and condemns it ; He saves 
out of it, and lifts up into the fellowship of His 



120 HOLY IN CHRIST. 

own purity and blessedness. This is the Holy 
One of Israel. 

It is this God who speaks to us, " I am the 
Lord your God : I am holy : I make holy." It is 
in the adoring contemplation of His Holiness, in 
the trustful surrender to it, in the loving fellow- 
ship with Himself, the Holy One, that we can be 
made holy. My brother ! would you be holy ? 
listen again, and let, in the deep silence of trust, 
God's words sink into your heart — '' Your Holy 
One." Come to Himself and claim Him as your 
God, and claim all that He, as the Holy One who 
makes holy, can do for you. Just remember that 
Holiness is Himself. Come to Him; worship 
Him; give Him the glory. Seek not, even from 
Him, holiness in yourself; let self be abased, 
and be content that the Holiness is His. As 
His presence fills your heart, as His Holi- 
ness and Glor}^ are your one desire, as His 
holy Will and Love are your delight, — as the Holy 
One becomes all in all to you, — you w411 be holy 
with the holiness He loves to see. And as, to the 
end, you see nothing to admire in self, and only 
Beauty in Him, you will know that He has laid 
of His glory on you ; and your holiness will be 
found in the song, There is none holy, but the 
Lord. 

Be ye holy, as I am holy. 



THE HOLY ONE OF ISRAEL, 121 

God ! we have again heard the wonderful 
revelation of Thyself, '' I am holy." And as we 
felt how infinitely exalted above all our concep- 
tions Thy Holiness is, we heard Thy call, almost 
still more wonderful, '' Be ye holy, as I am holy." 
And as every thought of how we were to be holy, 
as Thou art holy, failed us, we heard Thy voice 
once again, in this most wonderful word of all, 
•' I make you holy." I am "your Holy One." 

IVtost Holy God! we do beseech Thee, give us in 
some due measure to realize how unholy we are, 
and so to take the place that becomes us in Thy 
presence. Oh that the sinfulness of our nature, 
and all that is of self, may be so discovered to us, 
that it may be no longer possible to live in it! 
May tlie Light that reveals this, reveal too, how 
Thy Holiness is our only hope, our sure refuge, 
our complete deliverance. O Lord ! speak into 
our souls the word, " The Holy One, your Re- 
deemer," " Your Holy One," with such power by 
Thy Spirit, that our faith may grow into the 
assured confidence that we can be holy as Thou 
art hol3^ 

Holy Lord God! we wait for Thee. Reveal 
Thyself in power within us, and fit us to be the 
messengers of Thy Holiness, to tell Thy people 
how holy Thou art, and how holy we must be, 
and how holy Thou dost make us. Amen. 



122 HOLY IN CHRIST. 

1. This Holy One is God Almighty. Before He revealed 
Himself to Israel as the Holy One, He made Himself known 
to Abraham as the Almighty, " who quickeneth the dead/' In 
all your dealings with God for holiness, remember He is the 
Almighty One, who can do wonders in you. Say often, '' Glory 
to Him who is mighty to do exceeding abundantly above all we 

I ask or think." 

2. This Holy One is the Eighteous God, a consuming fire. 
Cast yourself into it, that all that is sinful may be destroyed. 
As you lay yourself upon the altar, expect the fire. "And 
yield your members unto God as instruments of Righteous- 
ness.'* 

3. This Holy One is the God of Love. He is your Father; 
yield yourself to let the Holy Spirit cry in you, Abba Father ! 
that is, to let Him shed abroad and fill your heart with God's 
father-love. God's Holiness is His fatherliness ; our holiness 
is childlikeness. Be simple, loving, trustful. 

4. This Holy One is God. Let Him be God to you ; ruling 
all, filling all, working all. Worship Him, come near to Him, 
live with and in and for Him : He will be your holiness. 



THE THBIGE HOLY ONE. 123 



TWELFTH DAY. 



HOLY IN CHRIST. 

" I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lifted up» 
Above Him stood the seraphim. And one cried to another,. 
and said, Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts : the whole earth 
is full of His glory." — Isa, vi. 1-3. 

" And the four living creatures, they have no rest day and 
night, saying, Holy, holy^ holy is the Lord God, the Almighty,, 
which was, and which is, and which is to come.'' — Rev. iv. 8. 

IT is not only on earth, but in heaven too, that 
the Holiness of God is His chief and most 
glorious attribute. It is not only on earth, but in 
heaven too, that the highest inspiration of adora- 
tion and praise makes mention of His Holiness. 
The brightest of living beings, they who are ever 
before and around and above the throne, find 
their glory in adoring and proclaiming the Holi- 
ness of God : surely there can be for us no higher 
honor than to study and to know, to worship and 
adore, to proclaim and show forth the glory of the 
Thrice Holy One. 



124 HOLT IN CHRIST, 

After Moses, as we know, Isaiah was the chief 
messenger of the Holiness of God. Each had a 
special preparation for his commission to make 
^ known the Holy One. Moses saw the Holy One 
in the fire, and hid his face and feared to look 
upon God, and so was prepared for being His 
messenger, and for praising Him as "glorious in 
holiness." Isaiah, as he heard the song of the 
seraphim, and saw the fire on the altar, and the 
house filled with the smoke, cried out, " Woe is 
me." It was not till, in the deep sense of the 
need of cleansing, he had received the touch of 
the fire and the purging of his sin, that he might 
bear to Israel the Gospel of the Holy One as its 
Redeemer. May it be in the spirit of fear and 
lowly worship that we listen to the song of the 
seraphim, and seek to know and worship the 
Thrice Holy One. And may ours too be the 
cleansing with the fire, that we may be found fit 
to tell God's people that He is the Holy One of 
Israel, their Redeemer. 

The threefold repetition of the Holy has at all 
times by the Church of Christ been connected 
with the Holy Trinity. The song of the living 
creatures around the throne {Rev. iv.) is evi- 
dence of the truth of this thought. We there find 
it followed by the adoration of Him who was, 
and is, and is to come, the Almighty : the Eternal 



THE THRICE HOLY ONE. 125 

Source, the present manifestation in the Son, the 
future perfecting of the revelation of God in the 
Spirit's work in His Church. The truth of the 
Holy Trinity is often regarded as an abstract doc- 
trine, with little direct bearing on practical life* 
So far is this from being the case, that a living 
faith must root in it: some spiritual insight into 
the relation and the operation of each of tlie 
Three, and the reality of their living Oneness, is 
an essential element of true growth in knowledge 
and spiritual understanding/ Let us here regard 
the Trinity specially in its relation to God's Holi- 
ness and as the source of ours. What does it 
mean that we adore the Thrice Holy One? God 
is not only holy, but makes holy: in the revela- 
tion of the Three Persons we have the revelation 
of the way in which God makes holy. 

^ The Divine necessity and meaning of the doctrine of the 
Trinity is seen from the counterpart we have of it in nature. In 
every living object that exists we distinguish first the life^ then 
the jortn or shape in which that life manifests itself, then the 
power or effect as seen in the result which the life acting in its 
form or manifestation produces. And so we have God as the 
Unseen One, the Fountain of life; the Son as the Form or 
Image of God, the manifestation of the Unseen Life ; and the 
Holy Spirit as the Power of that life proceeding from the 
Father and the Son, and working out the purpose of God's will 
in the Church. Applying this thought to God as the Holy One, 
we shall understand better the place of the Sou and the Spirit 
as they bring us to the Holiness of God. 



126 HOLT m CHRIST. 

The Trinity teaches us that God has revealed 
Himself in two ways. The Son is the Form of God, 
His manifestation as He shows Himself to man, 
the Image in which His unseen glory is embodied, 
and to which man is to be conformed. The 
Spirit is the Power of God, working in man, and 
leading him up to that Image. In Jesus, He who 
had been in the form of God took the form of 
man ; and the Divine Holiness was literally man- 
ifested in the form of a human life and the mem- 
bers of a human body. A new holy human 
nature was formed in Christ, to be communi- 
cated to us. In His death His ow^n personal 
holiness was perfected as human obedience, and 
so the power of sin conquered and broken. 
Therefore in the resurrection, through the Spirit 
of Holiness, He was declared to be the Son of 
God with power to impart His life to us. There 
the Spirit of Holiness was set free from the 
veil of the flesh, the trammels that hindered it, 
and obtained power to enter and dwell in man. 
The Holy Spirit was poured out as the fruit of 
Resurrection and Ascension. And the Spirit is now 
the Power of God in us, working upwards towards 
Christ to reproduce His life and Holiness in us, 
to fit us for fully receiving and showing forth Him 
in our lives. Christ from above comes to us as 
the embodiment of the Unseen Holiness of God; 



THE THBIGE HOLY ONE. 127 

the Spirit from within lifts us up to meet Him, 
and fits us to receive and make our own all that 
is in Him. 

The Triune God whom we adore is the Thrice 
Holy One: the mystery of the Trinity is the mys- 
tery of Holiness : the Glory and the Power of the 
Trinity is the Glory and Power of God who makes 
us holy. There is God dwelling in light inaccessi- 
ble, a consuming fire of Holy Love, destroying all 
that resists, glorifying into its own purity all that 
yields. There is the Son, casting Himself into 
that consuming fire, whether in its eternal blessed- 
ness in heaven, or its angry wrath on earth, a will- 
ing sacrifice, to be its food and its satisfaction, 
as well as the revelation of its power to destroy 
and to save. And there is the Spirit of Holiness, 
the flames of that mighty fire spreading on every 
side, convicting and judging as the Spirit of Burn- 
ing, and then transforming into its own brightness 
and holiness all that it can reach. All the rela- 
tions of the Three Persons to each other and to us 
have their root and their meaning in the revela- 
tion of God as the Holy One. As we know and 
partake of Him, we shall know and partake of 
Holiness. 

And how shall we know Him ? Let us learn to 
know the Holiness of God as the seraphs do : in 
the worship of the Thrice Holy One. Let us with 



128 HOLT IN C HEIST, 

veiled faces join in the ceaseless song of adoration : 
"Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts.'' Each 
time we meditate on the Word, each prayer to the 
Holy God, each act of faith in Christ the Holy 
One, each exercise of waiting dependence on the 
Holy Spirit, let it be in the spirit of worship: 
Holy, holy, holy. Let us learn to know the Holi- 
ness of God as Isaiah did. He was to be the 
chosen messenger to reveal and interpret to the peo- 
ple the name, the Holy One of Israel. His prepa- 
ration was the vision that made him cry out, " Woe 
is me ! for mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord 
of hosts." Let us bow in silence before the Holy 
One, until our comeliness too be turned into cor- 
ruption. And then let us believe in the cleansing 
fire from the altar, the touch of the live coals of 
the burning holiness, which not only consumes, 
but purges lips and heart to say, " Here am I, 
send me." Yes, let us worship, whether like the 
adoring seraphim, or like the trembling prophet, 
until we know that our service too is accepted, to 
tell forth the praise of the Thrice Holy One. 

Holy, holy, holy : if we are indeed to be the 
messengers of the Holy One, let us seek to enter 
fully into what this Thrice Holy means. Holy, 
the Father, God above us. High and Lifted up, 
whom no man hath seen or can see, whose Holiness 
none dare approach, but who doth Himself in His 



THE THBIGE HOLT ONE, 129 

Holiness draw nigh to make "holy. Holy, the 
Son, God with us, revealing Divine Holiness in 
human life, maintaining it amid the suffering of 
death for us, and preparing a holy life and nature 
for His people. Holy, the Spirit, God in us, the 
Power of Holiness within us, reaching out to and 
embracing Christ, and transforming our inner life 
into the union and communion of Him in whom 
we are holy. Holy, holy, holy ! it is all holiness. 
It is only holiness — perfect holiness. This is 
Divine holiness : holiness hidden and unapproach- 
able; holiness manifested and maintained in hu- 
man nature; holiness communicated and made 
our very own. 

The mj^stery of the Holy Trinit}^ is the mystery 
of the Christian life, the mystery of Holiness. 
The Three are One, and we need to enter ever 
more deepl}^ into the truth that neither of the 
Three ever works separate or independent of the 
other. The Son reveals the Father, and the 
Father reveals the Son. The Father gives not 
Himself, but the Spirit : the Spirit speaks not of 
Himself, but cries Abba Father ! The Son is our 
Sanctification, our Life, our All: the fulness is in 
Him. And yet we have ever to bow our knees to 
the Father for Him to reveal Christ in us, for 
Him to establish us in Christ. And the Father 
does not this without the Spirit : so that we have 
9 



130 HOLY IN CHRIST, 

to ask to be strengthened mightily by the Spirit, 
that Christ may dwell in us. Christ gives the Spirit 
to them that believe and love and obey ; the 
Spirit again gives Christ, formed within and 
dwelling in the heart. And so in each act of 
worship, and each step of growth, and each 
blessed experience of grace, all the Three Persons 
are actively engaged: the One is ever Three, the 
Three are ever One. 

Would you apply this in the life of holiness, 
let faith in the Holy Trinity be a living practical 
reality. In every prayer to the Father to sanctify 
you, take up your position in Christy and do it in 
the power of the Spirit within you. In every ex- 
ercise of faith in Christ as your Sanctification, let 
your posture be that of prayer to the Father and 
trust in Him as He delights to honor the Son, and 
of quiet expectancy of the SpiriVs working, through 
whom the Father glorifies the Son. In every sur- 
render of the soul to the sanctification of the Spirit, 
to His leading as the Spirit of Holiness, look to 
the Father who grants His mighty working, and 
who sanctifies through faith in the Son, and expect 
the Spirit's power to manifest itself in showing 
the will of God, and Jesus as your Sanctification. 
If for a time this appears at variance with the 
simplicity of childlike faith and prayer, be assured 
that as God has thus revealed Himself, He will 



THE THBICE HOLT ONE, 131 

teach you so to worship and believe. And so the 
Holy, holy, holy will become the deep undertone 
of all our worship and all our life. 

Children of God ! called to be holy as He is 
holy, oh, come let us bow down and worship in 
His holy presence ! Come and veil the face : with- 
draw eye and mind from gazing on what passes 
knowledge, and let the soul be gathered into that 
inner stillness, in which the worship of the 
heavenly Sanctuary alone can be heard. Come 
and cover the feet : withdraw from the rush of 
w^ork and haste, be it worldly or religious, and 
learn to worship. Come, and as you fall down in 
self-abasement, the glory of the Holy One will 
shine upon you. And as you hear and take up 
and sing the song. Holy, Holy, Holy, you will 
find how in such knowledge and worship of the 
Thrice Holy One is the power that makes you 
holy. 

Be holy, for I am holy. 



Holy, holy, holy, the Lord God Almighty ! 
which wast, and art, and art to come ! I worship 
Thee as the Triune God. With face veiled and 
feet covered, I would bow in deep humility and 
silence, till Thy mercy lift me as on eagles' wings 
to behold Thy glory. 



132 HOLT IN CHRIST. 

Most merciful God ! who hast called me to be 
holy as Thou art holy, oh, reveal to me some- 
what of Thy Holiness ! As it shines upon me 
and strikes death into the creature and the flesh, 
may even the most involuntary taint of sin, and 
its slightest movement, become unbearable. As it 
shines and revives the hope of being partaker of 
Thy Holiness, may the confidence grow strong 
that Thou Thj^self art making me holy, wilt even 
make me a messenger of Thy Holiness. 

Thrice Holy God ! I worship Thee as my God. 
Holy! the Father; holy and making holy; 
making holy His own Son and sending Him into 
the world, that we might behold the very glory of 
God in a human face, the face of Jesus Christ. 
Holy ! the Son ; the Holy One of God, fulfilling 
the will of the Father, and so making holy Him- 
self that He might be our holiness. Holy ! the 
Spirit; the Spirit of Holiness, dwelling within 
us, making the Son and His Holiness our own, 
and so making us partakers of the Holiness of God. 
my God ! I bow down, and worship, and adore. 

May even now the worship of heaven that rests 
not day or night be the. worship my soul renders 
Thee without ceasing. May its song be, down in 
the depths of the heart, the keynote of my life : 
Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty ! which 
wast, and art, and art to come. Amen. 



THE TliniCE HOLY ONE. 133 

1. Thought always needs to distinguish and separate: in 
life alone there is perfect unity. The more we know the 
living God, the more we shall realize how truly the Three are 
One. In each act of One Person the other Two are present. 
There is not a prayer rises but the Presence of the Holy Three 
is needed: through Christ, in the Spirit, we speak to the 
Father. 

2. In faith to apprehend this is to have the secret of holiness. 
The Holy God above us, ever giving and working; the Holy 
One of God, the living gift, who has possession of us, in whom 
we are; the Holy Spirit, God within us, through whom the 
Father works, and the Son is revealed : this is the God who 
says, I am holy, I make holy. In the perfect unity of the work 
of the Three, holiness is found. 

3. No wonder that the love of the Father and the grace of the 
Sou do not accomplish more, when the fellowship of the Holy 
Spirit is little understood or sought or accepted. The Holy 
Spirit is the fruit and crown of the Divine Revelation, through 
whom the Son and the Father come to us. If you would know 
God, if you would be holy, you must be taught and led of the 
Spirit. 

4. As often as you worship the Thrice Holy One, hearken if 
no voice be heard : Whom shall I send, and who will go for 
us ? Let the answer rise, Here am I, send me, and offer your- 
self to be a messenger of the holiness of God to those around 
you. 

5. When in meditation and worship you have sought to take 
in and express what God's word has taught, then comes the 
time for confessing how you know nothing, and for waiting on 
God to reveal Himself. 



134 HOLY IN CHBI8T. 



THIRTEENTH DAY. 

HOLY IN CHRIST. 
1bollne66 anD Ibumllitis. 

" Thus saith the High and Lofty One that inhabiteth eternity, 
whose name is Holy : I dwell in the High and Holy place, with 
him that is of a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit 
of the humble, and to revive the heart of the contrite ones,'* — 
Isa. Ivii. 15. 

VERY wonderful is the revelation we have in 
Isaiah of God, the Holy One, as the Re- 
deemer and the Saviour of His people. In the 
midst of the people whom He created and formed 
for Himself, He will as the Holy One dwell, show- 
ing forth His power and His glory, filling them 
with joy and gladness. All these promises have, 
how^ever, reference to the people as a whole. Our 
text to-day reveals a new and specially beautiful 
feature of the Divine Holiness in its relation to 
the individual. The High and Lofty One, whose 
name is Holy, and whose only fit dwelling-place is 
eternity. He looks to the man who is of a humble 



HOLINESS AND HUMILITY. 135 

and contrite heart; with him will He dwell. 
God's Holiness is His condescending Love. As 
it is a consuming fire against all who exalt them- 
selves before Him, it is to the spirit of the humble 
like the shining of the sun, heart-reviving and 
life-giving. 

The deep significance of this promise comes 
out clearly when we connect it with the other 
promises of New Testament times. The great 
feature of the New Covenant, in its superiority to 
the old, is this, that whereas in the law and its in- 
stitution all was external, in the New the king- 
dom of God would be within. God's laws given 
and written into the heart, a new spirit put with- 
in us, God's own Spirit given to dwell within our 
spirit, and so the heart and the inner life fitted to 
be the temple and home of God ; it is this consti- 
tutes the peculiar privilege of the ministration of 
the Spirit. Our text is perhaps the only one in. 
the Old Testament in which this indwelling of 
the Holy One, not among the people only, but in 
the heart of the individual believer, is clearly 
brought out. In this the two aspects of the 
Divine Holiness would reach their full manifesta- 
tion: I dwell in the High and Holy place, and 
with him also that is of a contrite and humble 
spirit. In His heaven above, the high and lofty 
place, and in our heart, contrite and humble, God 



136 HOLT IN CHRIST, 

Las His home. God's Holiness is His glory that 
separates Him by an infinite distance, not only 
from sin, but even from the creature, lifting Him 
high above it. God's Holiness is His Love, draw- 
ing Him down to the sinner, that He may lift him 
into His fellowship and likeness, and make him 
holy as He is holy. The Holy One seeks the 
humble ; the humble find the Holy One : such 
are the two lessons we have to learn to-day. 

The Holy One seeks the humble. There is nothing 
that has such an attraction for God, that has such 
affinity with holiness, as a contrite and humble 
spirit. The reason is evident. There is no law 
in the natural and the spiritual world more sim- 
ple, than that two bodies cannot at the same 
moment occupy the same space. Only so much 
as the new occupant can expel of what the space 
was filled with can it really possess. In man, 
self has possession, and self-will the mastery, and 
there is no room for God. It is simply impossible 
for God to dwell or rule when self is on the 
throne. As long as, through the blinding influ- 
ence of sin and self-love, even the believer is not 
truly conscious of the extent to which this self- 
will reigns, there can be no true contrition or 
humility. But as it is discovered by God's Spirit, 
and the soul sees how it has just been self that 
has been secretly keeping out God, with what 



HOLINESS AND HUMILITY, 137 

shame it is broken down, and how it longs to 
break utterly away from self, that God may have 
His place ! It is this brokenness, and continued 
breaking down, that is expressed by the word 
contrition. And as the soul sees what folly and 
guilt it has been, by its secret honoring of self, to 
keep the Holy One from the place which He alone 
has a right to, and which He would so blessedly 
have filled, it casts itself down in utter self-abase- 
ment, with the one desire to be nothing, and to 
give God the place and the praise that is His 
due. 

Such breaking down and humiliation is painful. 
Its intense reality consists in this, that the soul 
can see nothing in itself to trust or hope in. 
And least of all can it imagine that it should be 
an object of Divine complacency, or a fit vessel 
for the Divine blessing. And yet just this is the 
message which the Word of the Lord brings to 
our faith. It tells us that the Holy One, who 
dwells in the High and Lofty place, is seeking 
and preparing for Himself a dwelling here on this 
earth. It tells us, just what the truly contrite and 
humble never could imagine, and even now can 
hardly believe, that it is even, that it is only, with 
such that He will dwell. These are they in whom 
God can be glorified, in whom there is room for 
Him to take the place of self and to fill the emp- 



138 HOLY IN CHRIST, 

tied place with Himself. The Holy One seeks 
the humble. Just when we see that there is 
nothing in us to admire or rest in, God sees in us 
everything to admire and to rest in, because there 
is room for Himself. The lowly one is the home 
of the Holy One. 

The humble find the Holy One. Just when the 
consciousness of sin and weakness, and the dis- 
covery of how much of self there is, makes you 
fear that you can never be holy, the Holy One 
gives Himself. Not as you look at self, and seek 
to^now whether now you are contrite and hum- 
ble enough — no, but when no longer looking at 
self, because you have given up all hope of seeing 
anything in it but sin, you look up to the Holy 
One, you will see how His promise is your only 
hope. It is in faith that the Holy One is revealed 
to the contrite soul. Faith is ever the opposite 
of what we see and feel ; it looks to God alone. 
And it believes that in its deepest consciousness 
of unholiness, and its fear that it never can be 
holy, God, the Holy One, who makes holy, is near 
as Redeemer and Saviour. And it is content to 
be low, in the consciousness of unworthiness and 
emptiness, and yet to rejoice in the assurance that 
God Himself does take possession and revive the 
heart of the contrite one. Happy the soul who is 
willing at once to learn the lesson that, all along, 



HOLINESS AND HUMILITY. 139 

it is going to be the simultaneous experience of 
weakness and power, of emptiness and filling, of 
deep, real humiliation, and the as real and most 
wonderful indwelling of the Holy One. 

This is indeed the deep mystery of the Divine 
life. To human reason it is a paradox. When 
Paul says of himself, '* as dying, and behold we 
live ; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing ; as hav- 
ing nothing, yet possessing all things," he only 
gives expression to the law of the kingdom, tliat 
as self is displaced and man becomes nothing, 
God will become all. Side by side with deepest 
sense of nothingness and weakness, the sense of 
infinite riches and the joy unspeakable can fill the 
heart. However deep and blessed the experience 
becomes of the nearness, the blessing, the love, 
the actual indwelling of the Holy One, it is never 
an indwelling in the old self; it is ever a Divine 
Presence humbling self to make place for God 
alone to be exalted. The power of Christ's death, 
the fellowship of His cross, works each moment 
side by side with the power and the joy of His 
resurrection. *' He that humbleth himself shall 
be exalted ; " in the blessed life of faith the 
humiliation and the exaltation are simultaneous, 
each dependent on the other. 

The humble find the Holy One ; and when they 
have found, the possession only humbles all the 



140 HOLY m CHRIST. 

more. Not that there is no danger or temptation 
of the flesh exalting itself in the possession, but, 
once knowing the danger, the humble soul seeks 
for grace to fear continually, with a fear that only 
clings more firmly to God alone. Never for a 
moment imagine that you attain a state in which 
self or the flesh are absolutely dead. No ; by 
faith you enter into and abide in a fellowship 
with Jesus, in whom they are crucified ; abiding 
in Him, you are free from their power, but only 
as you believe, and, in believing, have gone out 
of self and dwell in Jesus. Therefore, the more 
abundant God's grace becomes, and the more 
blessed the indwelling of the Holy One, keep so 
much the lower. Your danger is greater, but 
your Help is now nearer : be content in trembling 
to confess the danger, it will make you bold in 
faith to claim the victory. 

Believers, who profess to be nothing, and to 
trust in grace alone, I pray you, do listen to the 
wondrous message. The High and Lofty One, 
whose name is Holy, and who dwells in the Holy 
Place, and who can dwell nowhere but in a Holy 
Place, seeks a dwelling here on earth. Will you 
give it Him? Will you not fall down in the dust, 
that He may find in you the humble heart He 
loves to dwell in ? Will you not now believe that 
€ven in you, however low and broken you feel, 



HOLTNESS AND HUMILITY. 141 

He doth delight to make His dwelling? '^ Blessed 
are the poor in spirit : for theirs is the King- 
dom ; " with them the King dwells. Oh, this is 
the path to holiness ! be humble, and the holy 
nearness and presence of God in you will be your 
holiness. As you hear the command, Be holy, as 
I am holy, let faith claim the promise, and 
answer, I will be holy, O Most Holy God ! if 
Thou, the Hol}^ One, wilt dwell with me. 

Be holy, as I AM HOLY. 



Lord ! Thou art the High and Lofty One, 
whose Name is Holy. And yet Thou speakest, '' I 
dwell in the high and holy place, and with him 
that is of a contrite and humble spirit." Yes, 
Lord ! when the soul takes the low place, and has 
low thoughts of itself, that it feels it is nothing, 
Thou dost love to come and comfort, to dwell with 
it and revive it. 

O my God ! my creature nothingness humbles 
me; my many transgressions humble me; my in- 
nate sinfulness humbles me ; but this humbles me 
most of all, Thine infinite condescension, and the 
ineffable indwelling Thou dost vouchsafe. It is 
Thy Holiness, in Christ bearing our sin, Thy 
Holy Love bearing with our sin, and consenting 



142 HOLY IN CHBI8T. 

to dwell in us ; God ! it is this love that passeth 
knowledge that humbles me. I do beseech Thee, 
let it do its work, until self hides its head and 
flees away at the presence of Thy glory, and Thou 
alone art all. 

Holy Lord God ! I pray Thee to humble me. 
Didst Thou not of old meet Thy servants, and 
show Thyself unto them until they fell upon 
their faces and feared? ThoU knowest, my God! 
I have no humility which I can bring Thee. In 
my blessed Saviour, who humbled Himself in the 
form of a servant, and unto the death of the cross, 
I hide myself. In Him, in His spirit and likeness, 
I would live before Thee. Work Thou it in me, 
by the Holy Spirit dwelling in me, and as I am 
dead to self in Him, and His cross makes me 
nothing, let Thy holy indwelling revive and 
quicken me. Amen. 

1. Lowliuess and holiness. Keep fast bold of the intimate con- 
nection. Lowliness is taking the place that becomes rae ; holi- 
ness, giving God the place that becomes Him. If I be nothing 
before Him, and God be all to me, I am in the sure path of 
holiness. Lowliness is holiness, because it gives all the glory- 
to God. 

2. " Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom 
of heaven." These first words of the Master when He opened 
His lips to proclaim the Kingdom, are often the last in the hearts 
of His disciples. "The Kingdom is in the Holy Ghost:" to 
the poor in spirit, those who know they have nothing that is 
really spiritual, the Holy Spirit comes to be their life. The 



HOLINESS AND HUMILITY. 143 

poor in spirit are the Kingdom of the Saints : in them the 
Holy Spirit reveals the King. 

3. Many strive hard to be humble with God, but with men 
they maintain their rights, and nourish self. Remember that 
the great school of humility before God, is to accept the hum- 
bling of man. Christ sanctified Himself in accepting the humil- 
iation and injustice which evil men laid upon Him. 

4. Humility never sees its own beauty, because it refuses to 
look to itself: it only wonders at the condescension of the Holy 
God, and rejoices in the humility of Jesus, God^s Holy One, 
our Holy One. 

5. The link between holiness and humility is indwelling. 
The Lofty One, whose name is Holy, dwells with the contrite 
one. And where he dwells is the Holy Place, 



144 HOLT IN CHItlST, 



FOURTEENTH DAY. 



HOLY IN CHRIST. 
Zhc 1bol^ ©ne ot (3oD» 

" Therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee 
shall be called the Son of God/' — Luke i. 35. 

" We have believed and know that Thou art the Holy One of 
God:'— John vi. 69. 

''n'^HE holy one of the Lord "—only once {Ps. 

J- cvi. 16) the expression is found in the Old 
Testament. It is spoken of Aaron, in whom 
holiness, as far as it could then be revealed, had 
found its most complete embodiment. The title 
waited for its fulfilment in Him who alone, in His 
own person, could perfectly show forth the holi- 
ness of God on earth — Jesus the Son of the 
Father. In Him we see holiness, as Divine, as 
human, as our very own. 

1. In Him we see wherein that Incomparable 
Excellence of the Divine Nature consists. " Thou 
lovest righteousness, and hatest iniquit}^, therefore 
God, even Thy God, hath anointed Thee with the 



THE HOLY ONE OF GOD. 145 

oil of gladness above Thy fellows." God's infinite 
hatred of sin, and His maintenance of the Right, 
might appear to have little moral worth, as being 
a necessity of His nature. In the Son we see 
Divine Holiness tested. He is tried and tempted. 
He suffers, being tempted. He proves that Holi- 
ness has indeed a moral worth: it is ready to 
make any sacrifice, yea to give up life and cease 
to be, rather than consent to sin. In giving Him- 
self to die, rather than yield to the temptation of 
sin ; in giving Himself to die, that the Father's 
righteous judgment may be honored ; Jesus proved 
how Righteousness is an element of the Divine 
Holiness, and how the Holy One is sanctified in 
Righteousness. 

But this is only one side of Holiness. The fire 
that consumes also purifies: it makes partakers 
of its ow^n beautiful Light-nature all that is capa- 
ble of assimilation. So Divine Holiness not only 
maintains its own purity ; it communicates it too. 
Herein was Jesus indeed seen to be the Holy 
One of God, that He never said, " Stand by, for I 
am holier than thou." His holiness proved itself 
to be the very incarnation of Him who had 
spoken, ''Thus saith the High and Lofty One, 
whose Name is Holy : I dwell in the High and 
Holy place, and with him who is of a contrite 
spirit." In Him was seen the affinity holiness 
10 



146 HOLT IN CHRIST. 

has for all that is lost and helpless and sinful. 
He proved that holiness is not only the energy 
which in holy anger separates itself from all that 
is impure, but which in holy love separates to 
itself even what is most sinful, to save and to 
bless. In Him we see how the Divine Holiness 
is the harmony of Infinite Righteousness with 
Infinite Love. 

2. Such is the Divine aspect of the character of 
Christ, as He shows in human form what God's 
Holiness is. But there is another aspect, to us no 
less interesting and important. We not only want 
to know how God is holy, but how man must act 
to be holy as God is holy. Jesus came to teach 
us that it is possible to be men, and yet to have 
the life of God dwelling in us. We ordinarily 
think that the glory and the infinite Perfection of 
Deity are the proper setting in which the beauty 
of holiness is to be seen : Jesus proved the perfect 
adaptation and suitability of human nature for 
showing forth that which is the essential glory of 
Deity. He showed us how, in choosing and doing 
the will of God, and making it his own will, man 
may truly be holy as God is holy. 

The value of this aspect of the Incarnation 
depends upon our realizing intensely the true 
humanity of our Lord. The awful separating and 
purifying process that is ever being carried on in 



THE HOLY ONE OF GOD. 147 

the fiery furnace of the Divine Holiness, ever con- 
suming and ever assimilating, we expect to see in 
Him in the struggles of a truly human will. 
Holiness, to be truly human, must not only be a 
gift, but an acquirement. Coming from God, it 
must be accepted and personally appropriated, in 
the voluntary surrender of all that is not in 
accordance with it. In Jesus, as He distinctly 
gave up His own will, and did and suffered the 
Father's will, we have the revelation of what 
human holiness is, and how truly man, through 
the unity of will, can be holy as God is holy. 

3. But what avails that we have seen in Jesus 
that a man can be holy? His example were in- 
deed a mockery if He show us not the way, and 
give us not the power, to become like Himself. 
To bring us this, was indeed the supreme object 
of the Incarnation. The Divine nature of Christ 
did not simply make His humanity partaker of 
its holiness, leaving Him still nothing more than 
an individual man. His Divinity gave the 
human holiness He wrought out, the holy human 
nature which He perfected, an infinite value and 
power of communication. With Him a new life, 
the Eternal Life, was grafted into the stem of 
humanity. For all who believe in Him, He sanc- 
tified Himself, that they themselves might also 
be sanctified in truth. Because His death was 



148 HOLT IN C HEIST, 

the great triumph of His obedience to the will of 
the Father, it broke for ever the dominion of sin, 
it atoned for our guilt, and won for Him from the 
Father the power to make His people partakt^rs 
of His own life and holiness. In His Resurrec- 
tion and Ascension the power of the Nevy Life, 
and its right to universal dominion, were made 
manifest, and He is now in full truth the Holy- 
One of God, holding in Himself as Head the 
power of a Holiness, at once Divine and human, 
to communicate to every member of His body. 

The Holy One of God ! in a fulness of mean- 
ing that passeth knowledge, in spirit and in 
truth, Jesus now bears this title. He is now the 
One Holy One whom God sees, of such an infinite 
compass and power of holiness, that He can be 
holiness to each of His brethren. And even as 
He is to God the Holy One, in whom He delights, 
and for whose sake He delights in all who are in 
Him, so Christ may now be to us too the One 
Holy One in whom we delight, in whom the 
Holiness of God is become ours. " We have be- 
lieved and know that Thou art the Holy One of 
God,^^ — blessed they who can say this, and tnow 
themselves to be holy in Christ. 

In speaking of the mystery of the Holy Trinity, 
we saw how Christ stands midway between the 
Father and the Spirit, as the point of union in 



THE HOLY ONE OF GOD. 149 

which they meet. In the Son, ^' the very image 
of His substance" (Heb, i, 3), we have the objec- 
tive revelation of Deity, the Divine Holiness em- 
bodied and brought nigh. In the Holy Spirit we 
have the same revelation subjectively, the Divine 
Holiness entering our inmost being and revealing it- 
self there. The work of the Holy Spirit is to re- 
veal and glorify Christ as the Holy One of God, 
as He takes of His Holiness and makes it ours. 
He shows us how all is in Christ ; how Christ is 
all for us ; how we are in Christ ; and how, as a 
living Saviour, Christ through His Spirit takes 
and keeps charge of us and our life of holiness. 
He makes Christ indeed to be to us the Holy One 
of God, 

My Brother! wouldst thou be holy, wouldst 
thou know God's way of holiness — learn to know 
Christ as the Holy One of God. Thou art in Him^ 
"holy in Christ." Thou hast been placed, by an 
act of Divine Power, in Christ, and that same 
Power keeps thee there, planted and rooted in 
that Divine fulness of life and holiness which 
there is in Him. His Holy Presence, and the 
power of His eternal life, surround thee : let the 
Holy Spirit reveal this to thee. The Holy Spirit 
is within thee as the power of Christ and His life. 
Secretly, silently, but mightily, if thou wilt look 
to the Father for His working, will He strengthen 



150 HOLY IN C HEIST, 

the faith that thou art in Christ, and that the 
Divine life, which thus encircles thee on e very- 
side, will enter in and take possession of thee. 
Study and pray to believe and realize that it is in 
Christ as the Holy One of God, in Christ in whom 
the Holiness of God is prepared for thee as a holy 
nature and holy living, that thou art, and that 
thou mayest abide. 

And then remember, also, that this Christ is thy 
Saviour, the most patient and compassionate of 
teachers. Study holiness in the light of His 
countenance, looking up into His face. He came 
from heaven for the very "purpose of making thee holy. 
His love and power are more than thy slowness 
and sinfulness. Do learn to think of holiness 
as the inheritance prepared for thee, as the power 
of a new life which Jesus waits and lives to dis- 
pense. Just think of it as all in Him, and of its 
possession as being dependent upon the posses- 
sion of Himself. And as the disciples, though 
they scarce understood what they confessed, or 
knew whither the Lord was leading them, became 
His saints, His holy ones, in virtue of their in- 
tense attachment to Him, so wilt thou find that 
to love Jesus fervently, and obey Him simply, is 
the sure path to holiness and the fulness of the 
Holy Spirit. 

Be ye holy, as I am holy. 



THE HOLY ONE OF GOD. 151 

Most Holy Lord God! I do bless Thee that 
Thy beloved Son, whom Thou didst sanctify and 
send into the world, is now to us the Holy One of 
God, I beseech Thee that my inner life may so 
be enlightened by the Spirit that I may in faith 
fully know what this means. 

May I know Him as the revelation of Thy 
Holiness, the incarnation in human nature, even 
unto the death, of Thine infinite and unconquer- 
able hatred of sin, as of Thy amazing love to the 
sinner. May my soul be filled with great fear 
and trust of Thee. 

May I know Him as the exhibition of the Holi- 
ness in which we are now to walk before Thee. He 
lived in Thy holy will. May I know Him as He 
wrought out that holiness, to be communicated to 
us in a new human nature, making it possible for 
us to live a holy life. 

May I know Him as Thou hast placed me in 
Him in heaven, holy in Christ, and as I may 
abide in Him by faith. 

May I know Him, as He dwells in me, the Holy 
One of God on the throne of my heart, breathing 
His Holy Spirit and maintaining His holy rule. 
So shall I live holy in Christ. 

O my Father ! it pleased Thee that in Thy Son 
should all the fulness dwell. In Him are hid all 
the treasures of wisdom and knowledge; in Him 



152 HOLT IN CHBI8T, 

dwell the unsearchable riches of grace and holi- 
ness. I beseech Thee, reveal Him to me, reveal 
Him in me, that I may not have to satisfy myself 
with thoughts and desires, without the reality, 
but that in the power of an endless life I may 
know Him, and be known of Him, the Holy One 
of God. Amen. 

1. In the holiness of Jesus we see what ours must be : right- 
eousness, that hates sin and gives everything to have it de- 
stroyed ; love, that seeks the sinner and gives everything to 
have him saved. " Whosoever doeth not righteousness is not 
of God, neither he that loveth not his brother." 

2. It is a solemn thought that we may be studying earnestly 
to know what holiness is, and yet have little of it, because we 
have little of Jesus. It is a blessed thought that a man may 
directly be little occupied with the thought of holiness, and yet 
have much of it, because he is full of Jesus. 

3. We need the whole of what God teaches in His Word in 
regard to holiness in all its different aspects. W^e need still 
more to be ever returning to the living centre where God im- 
parts holiness. Jesus is the Holy One of God : to have Him 
truly, to love Him fervently, to trust and obey Him, to be in 
Him — this makes us holy. 

4. Your holiness is thus treasured up in this Divine, 
Almighty, and most gentle Saviour — surely there need be no 
fear that He will not be ready or able to make you holy. 

5. With such a Sanctifier, how comes it that so many seekers 
after holiness fail so sadly, and know so little of the joy of a 
holy life? 

I am sure it is with very many this one thing : they seek to 
grasp and hold this Christ in their own strength, and know not 
how it is the Holy Spirit within them who must be waited for to 
reveal this Divine Being, the Holy One of God, in their hearts. 



THE HOLY SPIRIT. 153 



FIFTEENTH DAY. 

HOLY IN CHRIST. 
XEbe 1boli2 Spirit* 

" But this spake He of the Spirit, which they that believed 
on Him were to receive : for the Holy Spirit was not yet : be- 
cause Jesus was not yet glorified.^' — John vii. 39. 

" The Comforter, even the Holy Spirit^ whom the Father will 
send in my name, He shall teach you all things." — John xiv. 26. 

" God chose you to salvation in sanctijication of the Spirit, 
and belief of the truth."— 2 Thess. ii. 13. (See 1 Pet, i. 2.) 

IT has sometimes been said, that while the Holi- 
ness of God stands out more prominently in 
the Old Testament, in the New it has to give way 
to the revelation of His love. The remark could 
hardly be made if it were fully realized that the 
Spirit is God, and that when He takes up the epi- 
thet Holy as His own proper name, it is to teach 
us that now the Holiness of God is to come nearer 
than ever, and to be specially revealed as the 
power that makes us holy. In the Holy Spirit, 
God the Holy One of Israel, and He who was the 



154 HOLT IN CHRIST. 

Holy One of God, come nigh for the fulfilment of 
the promise, " I am the Lord that make you holy." 
The unseen and unapproachable holiness of God 
had been revealed and brought near in the life of 
Christ Jesus ; all that hindered our participation 
in it had been removed by His death. The name 
of Holy Spirit teaches us that it is specially the 
Spirit's work to impart it to us and make it our 
own. 

Try and realize the meaning of this ; the epithet 
that through the whole Old Testament has be- 
longed to the Holy God, is now appropriated to 
that Spirit which is within you. The Holiness of 
God in Christ becomes holiness in you, because 
this Spirit is in you. The words, and the Divine 
realities the words express, Holy and Spirit, are 
now inseparably and eternally united. You can 
only have as much of the Spirit as you are willing 
to have of holiness. You can only have as much 
holiness as you have of the indwelling Spirit. 

There are some who pray for the Spirit because 
they long to have His light and joy and strength. 
And yet their prayers bring little increase of bless- 
ing or power. It is because they do not rightly 
know or desire Him as the Holy Spirit. His burn- 
ing purity, His searching and convicting light. His 
making dead of the deeds of the body, of self 
with its will and its power, His leading into the 



THE HOLT 8P1BIT, 155 

fellowship of Jesus as He gave up His will and 
His life to the Father, — of all this they have not 
thought. The Spirit cannot work in power in 
them because they receive Him not as the Holy 
Spirit, in sanctification of the Spirit. At times, in 
seasons of revival, as among the Corinthians and 
Galatians, He may indeed come with His gifts 
and mighty workings, while His sanctifying power 
is but little manifest. 1 Cor. xiv. 4, xiii. 8, iii. 
1-3 ; GaL iii. 3, v. 15-26. But unless that sancti- 
fying power be acknowledged and accepted. His 
gifts will be lost. His gifts coming on us are but 
meant to prepare the way for the sanctifying 
power within us. We must take the lesson to 
heart; we can have as much of the Spirit as we 
are willing to have of His Holiness. Be full of 
the Spirit, must mean to us, Be fully holy. 

The converse is equally true. We can only 
have so much holiness as we have of the Spirit. 
Some souls do very earnestly seek to be holy, but 
it is very much in their own strength. They will 
read books and listen to addresses most earnestly ; 
they will use every effort to lay hold of every 
thought, and act out every advice. And yet they . 
must confess that they are still very much 
strangers to the true, deep rest and joy and power 
of abiding in Christ, and being holy in Him. 
They sought for holiness more than for the 



156 HOLT m CUBIST, 

Spirit. They must learn how even all the holi- 
ness which is so near and clear in Christ, is be- 
yond our reach, except as the Holy Spirit dwells 
within and imparts it. They must learn to pray 
for Him and His mighty strengthening (^Eph, iii. 
16;, to believe for Him {John iv. 14, vii. 37), in 
faith to yield to Him as indwelling. 1 Cor, iii. 14, 
vi. 19. They must learn to cease from self-effort 
in thinking and believing, in willing and in run- 
ning; to hope in God, and wait patiently for 
Him. He will by His Holy Spirit make v^ holy. 
Be holy means, Be filled with the Spirit. 

If we inquire more closely how it is that this 
Holy Spirit makes hol}^ the answer is, — He 
reveals and imparts the Holiness of Christ. 
Scripture tells us : Christ is made unto us sancti- 
fication. He sanctified Himself for us, that we 
ourselves might also be sanctified in truth. We 
have been sanctified through the offering of the 
body of Jesus Christ once for all. We are sancti- 
fied in Christ Jesus. The whole living Christ is 
just a treasury of holiness for man. In His life 
*. on earth He exchanged the Divine Holiness He 
.possessed into the current coin needed for this 
human earthly life, obedience to the Father, and 
humility, and love, and zeal. As God, He has a 
sufficiency of it for every moment of the life of 
every believer. 



THE HOLY SPIRIT, 157 

And yet, it is all beyond our reach, except as 
the Holy Spirit brings it to us and inwardly com- 
municates it. But this is the very work for which 
He bears the Divine Name, the Holy Spirit, to 
glorify Jesus, the Holy One of God, within us, 
and so make us partakers of His Holiness. He 
does it by revealing Christ, so that we begin to 
see w^hat is in Him. He does it by discovering 
the deep unholiness of our nature. Romi. vii. 14- 
23. He does it by mightily strengthening us to 
believe, to receive Jesus Himself as our life. He 
does it by leading us to utter despair of self, to 
absolute surrender of obedience to Jesus as Lord, 
to the assured confidence of faith in the power of 
an indwelling Christ. He does it by, in the secret 
silent depths of the heart and life, imparting the 
dispositions and graces of Christ, so that from the 
inner centre of our life, which has been renewed 
and sanctified in Christ, holiness should flow out 
and pervade all to the utmost circumference. 
Where the desire has once been awakened, and 
the delight in the law of God after the inward 
man been created, there, as the Spirit of this life 
in Christ Jesus, He makes free from the law of 
sin and death in the members, he leads into the 
glorious liberty of the sons of God. As God 
within us. He communicates what God in Christ 
has prepared. 



158 HOLY m CHRIST. 

And if we ask once more how the working of 
this Holy Spirit, who thus makes holy, is to be 
secured, the answer is very simple and clear. He 
is the Spirit of the Holy Father, and of Christ, 
the Holy One of God : from them He must be 
received. " He showed me a river of water of 
life proceeding out of the throne of God and the 
Lamb." Jesus speaks of " the Holy Spirit, whom 
the Father will send in my Name." He taught 
us to ask the Father. Paul prays for the Ephe- 
sians : " I bow my knees to the Father, that He 
may grant unto you, according to the riches of 
His glory, that ye may be strengthened with 
might by His Spirit in the inner man." It is as 
we look to God in His Holiness, and all its revela- 
tion from Creation downward, and see how the 
Spirit now flows out from the throne of His Holi- 
ness as the water of life, that our hope will be 
awakened that God will give Him to work 
mightily in us. And as we then see Jesus reveal- 
ing that holiness in human nature, rending the 
veil in His atoning death, that the Spirit from the 
Holiest of all may come forth and, as the Holy 
Spirit, be His representative, making Him present 
within us, we shall become confident that faith in 
Jesus will bring the fulness of the Spirit. As He 
told us to ask the Father, He told us to believe in 
Himself. '' He that believeth in me, rivers of 



THE HOLT SPIRIT. 159 

living water shall flow out of him." Let us bow to 
the Father in the name of Christ, His Son ; let us 
believe very simply in the Son as Him in whom 
we are well-pleasing to the Father, and through 
whom the Father's love and blessing reach us, 
and we may be sure the Spirit, w^ho is already 
within us, will, as the Holy Spirit, do His work 
in ever-increasing power. The mystery of holi- 
ness is the mystery of the Trinity : as we bow to 
the Father, believing in the Son, the Holy Spirit 
will work. And we shall see the true meaning of 
what God spake in Israel: "/ am holy^'^ thus 
speaks the Father; " Be holy^'^^ as my Son and in 
my Son; ^^ I make holy,^^ through the Spirit of my 
Son dwelling in you. Let our souls worship and 
cry out, ^'Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God of 
hosts." 

The Holy Spirit. All true knowledge of the 
Father in His adorable Holiness, and of the Son 
in His, which is meant to be ours, and all partic- 
ipation of it, depend upon our life In the Spirit, 
upon our knowing and owning Him as abiding in 
us as our Life. Oh, what can it be that, with 
such a Thrice Holy God, His Holiness does not 
more cover His Church and children? The 
Holy Spirit is among us, is in us : it must be we 
grieve and resist Him. If you would not do so, 
at once bow the knee to the Father, that He may 



160 HOLY IN CHRIST. 

grant you the Spirit's mighty workings in the 
inner man. Believe that the Holy Spirit, bearer 
to you of all the Holiness of God and of Jesus, 
is indeed in you. Let Him take the place of self, 
with its thoughts and efforts. Set your soul still 
before God in holy silence, for Him to give you 
wisdom ; rest, in emptiness and poverty of spirit, 
in the faith that He will work in His own way. 
As Divine as is the Holiness that Jesus brings, so 
Divine is the power in which the Holy Spirit 
communicates it. Yield yourself day by day in 
growing dependence and obedience, to wait on 
and be led of Him. Let the fear of the Holy 
One be on you : sanctify the Lord God in your 
heart : let Him be your fear and dread. Fear 
not only sin : fear above all self, as it thrusts 
itself in before God with its service. Let self die, 
in refusing and denying its work: let the Holy 
Spirit, in quietness, and dependence, in the sur- 
render of obedience and trust, have the rule, 
the free disposal of every faculty. Wait for Him 
—He can. He will in power reveal and impart the 
Holiness of the Father and the Son/ 

Be holy, as I AM HOLY. 

1 1 cannot say how deeply I feel that one of the great wants 
of believers is that they do not know the Holy Spirit, who is 
within them, and thereby lose the blessed life He would work 
in them. If it please God, I hope that the next volume of this 



THE HOLY SPIRIT. 161 

Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of hosts ! the whole 
earth is full of Thy glory! Let that glory fill the 
heart of Thy child, as he bows before Thee. I 
come now to drink of the river of the water of life 
that flows from under the throne of God and of the 
Lamb. Glory be to God and to the Lamb for the 
gift that hath not entered into the heart of man to 
conceive — the gift of the Holy indwelling Spirit. 

O my Father ! in the name of Jesus I ask Thee 
that I may be strengthened with might by Thy 
Spirit in the inner man. Teach me, I pray Thee, 
to believe that Thou hast given Him, to accept and 
expect Him to fill and rule my whole inner being. 
Teach me to give up to Him ; not to will or to- 
run, not to think or to work in my strength, but 
in quiet confidence to wait and to know that He 
works in me. Teach me what it is to have no 
confidence in the flesh, and to serve Thee in the 
Spirit. Teach me what it is in all things to be 
led by Thy Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Thy Holi- 
ness. 

And grant, gracious Father, that through Him 
I may hear Thee speak and reveal Thyself to me 
in power : I am holy. May He glorify to me and 
in me, Jesus, in whom Thy command " Be holy " 

series may be on The Spirit of Christ. May the Fatlier give 
me a message that shaU help His children to know what the 
Holy Spirit can be to them. 
11 



162 HOLT IN CHRIST. 

hath been so blessedly fulfilled on my behalf. 
And let the Holy Spirit give me the anointing and 
the sealing which bring the perfect assurance that 
in Him Thy promise is being gloriously fulfilled, 
" I MAKE YOU HOLY." Amen. 

1. It is universally admitted that the Holy Spirit has not, in 
the teaching of the Church or the faith of believers, that place 
of honor and power, which becomes Him as the Revealer of 
the Father and the Son. Seek a deep conviction that without 
the Holy Spirit the clearest teaching on holiness, the most 
fervent desires, the most blessed experiences even, will only be 
temporary, will produce no permanent result, will bring no 
abiding rest. 

2. The Holy Spirit dwells within, and works within, in the 
hidden deep of your nature. Seek above everything the clear 
and habitual assurance that He is within you, doing His work. 

3. To this end, deny self and its work in serving God. Your 
own power to think and pray and believe and strive — lay it all 
down expressly and distinctly in God's presence ; claim, ac- 
cept, and believe in the hidden workings of the indwelling 
Spirit. 

4. As the Son ever spake of the Father, so the Spirit ever 
points to Christ. The soul that yields itself to the Spirit will 
of Him learn to know how Christ is our holiness, how we can 
always abide in Christ our Sanctification. What a vain effort 
it has often been without the Spirit! ^^As the anointing taught 
you^ ye abide in Him.*' 

5. In the temple of thine heart, beloved believer, there is a 
secret place, within the veil, where dwells, often all unknown, 
the Spirit of God. Do bow in deep reverence before the Father, 
and ask that He may work mightily. Expect the Spirit to do 
His work: He will make thy inner man a fit home, thy 
heart a throne, for Jesus, and reveal Him there. 



HOLINESS AND TRUTH. 163 



SIXTEENTH DAY. 



HOLY IN CHRIST. 
IboUneea auD ttrutb^ 

** Make them holy in the Truth : Thy word is Truths ^vhn 
xvii. 17. 

'* God chose you unto salvation in sanctijication an^iociief of 
the Truth.''— 2 Thess. ii. 12. 

THE chief means of sanctification that God uses 
is His word. And yet how much there is of 
reading and studying, of teaching and preaching 
the word, that has almost no effect in making men 
holy. It is not the word that sanctifies ; it is God 
Himself who alone can sanctify. Nor is it simply 
through the word that God does it, but through 
the Truth which is in the word. As a means the 
word is of unspeakable value, as the vessel which 
contains the truth, if God use it ; as a means it is 
of no value, if God does not use it. Let us strive 
to connect God's Holy Word with the Holy God 
Himself. God sanctifies in the Truth through 
His word. 



164 HOLT IN CHBIST. 

Jesus had just said, "The words which Thou 
gavest me, I have given them." Let us try and 
realize what that means. Think of that great 
transaction in eternity : the Infinite Being, whom 
we call God, giving His words to His Son ; in His 
words opening up His hearty communicating His 
mind and will, revealing Himself and all His 
purpose and love. In a Divine power and reality 
passing all conception, God gave Christ His words. 
In the same living power Christ gave them to His 
disciples, all full of a Divine life and energy to 
work in their hearts, as they were able to receive 
them. And just as in the words of a man on 
earth we expect to find all the wisdom or all the 
goodness there is in him, so the word of the Thrice 
Holy One is all alive with the Holiness of God. 
All the the holy fire, alike of His burning zeal 
and His burning love, dwells in His words. 

And yet men can handle these words, and 
study them, and speak them, and be entire stran- 
gers to their holiness, or their power to make 
holy. It is God Himself, the Holy One, who 
must make holy through the word. Every seed, 
in which the life of a tree is contained, has 
around it a husk or shell, which protects and 
hides the inner life. Only where the seed finds a 
place in congenial soil, and the husk is burst and 
removed, can the seed germinate and grow up. 



HOLINESS AND TRUTH. 165 

And it is only where there is a heart in harmony 
with God's Holiness, longing for it, yielding itself 
to it, that the word will really make holy. It is 
the heart that is not content with the word, but 
seeks the Living, Holy One in the word, to which 
He will reveal the truth, and in it Himself. It is 
the word given to us by Christ as God gave it / 
Him, and received by us as it was by Him, to 
rule and fill our life, which has power to make 
holy. 

But we must notice very specially how our 
Saviour says. Sanctify them, not in the word, but 
in the truth. Just as in man there is body, soul, 
and spirit, so in truth too. There is first word- 
truth; a man may have the correct form of words 
while he does not really apprehend the truth they 
contain. Then there is thought-truth; there may 
be a clear intellectual apprehension of truth with- 
out the experience of its power. The Bible 
speaks of truth as a living reality : this is the 
life-truth^ in which the very Spirit of the truth we ' 
profess has entered and possessed our inner 
being. Christ calls Himself the Truth: He is said 
to be full of grace and truth. The Divine life 
and grace are in Him as an actually substantial 
existence and reality. He not only acts upon us 
by thoughts and motives, but communicates, as a 
reality^ the eternal life He brought for us from the 



166 HOLY m CHRIST, 

Father. The Holy Spirit is called the Spirit of 
Truth ; what He imparts is all real and actual, 
the very substance of unseen things; He guides 
into the Truth, not thought-truth or doctrine 
only, but life-truth, the personal possession of the 
Truth as it is in Jesus. As the Spirit of Truth 
He is the Spirit of Holiness ; the life of God, 
which is His Holiness, He brings to us as an 
actual possession. 

It is now of this living Truth, which dwells in 
the word, as the seed-life dwells in the husk, that 
Jesus says, " Make them holy in the Truth : Thy 
word is Truth." He would have us mark the inti- 
mate connection, as well as the wide difference, 
between the word and the truth. The connection 
is one willed by God and meant to be inseparable, 
*• Thy word is truth ; " with God they are one. 
But not with man. Just as there were men in 
close contact and continual intercouse with Jesus, 
to whom He was only a man, and nothing more, 
so there are Christians who know and understand 
the word, and yet are strangers to its true spirit- 
ual power. They have the letter but not the 
spirit; the Truth comes to them in word but not 
in power. The word does not make them holy, 
because they hold it not in Spirit and in Truth. 
To others, on the contrary, who know what it is 
to receive the truth in the love of it, who yield 



HOLINESS AND TRUTH. 167 

themselves, in all their dealings with the word, to 
the Spirit of Truth who dwells in it and in them 
too, the word comes indeed as Truth, as a Divine 
reality, communicating and working what it 
speaks of. And it is of such a use of the word 
that the Saviour says, " Make them holy in the 
'truth : Thy word is truth.'' As the words, which 
God gave Him, were all in the power of the eter- 
nal Life and Love and Will of God, the revelation 
and communication of the Father's purpose, as 
God's word was Truth to Him and in Him, so it 
can be in us. And as we thus receive it, we are 
are made holy in the Truth. 

And what now are the lessons we have to learn 
here for the path of Holiness ? The first is : Let 
us see to it that in all our intercourse with God's 
Blessed Word we rest content with nothing short 
of the experience of it, as truth of God, as spirit 
and as power. Jesus said, " If ye abide in my 
word, ye shall know the truth." No analysis can 
ever find or prove the life of a seed : plant it in 
its proper soil, and the growth will testify to the 
life. It is only as the word of God is received in 
the love of it, as it grows and works in us, that 
we can know its truth, can know that it is the 
Truth of God. It is as we live in the words of 
Jesus, in love and obedience, keeping and doing 
them, that the Truth from heaven, the Power of 



168 HOLT IJSr CHRIST. 

the Divine Life which there is in them, will 
unfold itself to us. Christ is the Truth ; in Him 
the love and grace, the very life of God, has 
come to earth as a substantial existence, a Living, 
Mighty Power, something new that was never on 
€arth before {John i. 17) ; let us yield ourselves to 
the Living Christ to possess us and to rule us as 
the Living Truth, then will God's word be Truth 
to us and in us. 

The Spirit of Christ is the Spirit of Truth ; that 
actual heavenly reality of Divine life and love in 
Christ, the Truth, has a Spirit, who comes to com- 
municate and impart it. Let us beware of trying 
to study or understand or take possession of 
God's word without that Spirit through whom the 
word was spoken of old ; we shall find only the 
husk, the truth or thought and sentiment, very 
beautiful perhaps, but with no power to make us 
holy. We must have the Spirit of the Truth 
within us. He will lead us into the Truth ; when 
we are in the Truth, God makes us holy in it and 
by it. The Truth must be in us, and we in it. 
God des^'res truth in the inward parts : we must 
be of the people of whom Christ says, " If ye 
were of the truth," '^ he that is of the truth know- 
eth me." In the lower sphere of daily life and 
conduct, of thought and action, there must be an 
intense love of truth, and a willingness to sacri- 



HOLINESS AND TBUTH, 169 

fice everything for it ; in the spiritual life, a deep 
hungering to have all our religion every day, 
every naoment, stand fully in the truth of God. 
It is to the simple, humble, childlike spirit that 
the truth of the word will be unsealed and 
revealed. In such the Spirit of truth comes to 
dwell. In such, as they daily wait before the 
Holy One in silence and emptiness, in reverence 
and holy fear, His Holy Spirit works and gives 
the truth within. In thus imparting Christ as 
revealed in the word, in His Divine life and love, 
as their own life. He makes them holy with the 
holiness of Christ. 

There is another lesson. Listen to that prayer, 
the earthly echo of the prayer which He ever 
liveth to pray, " Holy Father ! make them holy in 
the truth." Would you be holy, child of God ? 
cast yourself into that mighty current of interces- 
sion ever flowing into, ever reaching, the Father's 
bosom. Let yourself be borne upon it until your 
whole soul cries, with the unutterable groanings, 
too deep and too intense for human speech, '* Holy 
Father! make me holy in the truth." As you 
trust in Christ as the truth, the reality of what you 
long for, and in His all-prevailing intercession ; as 
you wait for the Spirit within as the Spirit of 
truth ; look up to the Father, and expect His own 
direct and almighty working to make you holy. 



170 HOLY IN CHBIST. 

The mystery of holiness is the mystery of the 
Triune One. The deeper entrance into the holy 
life rests in the fellowship of the Three in One. 
It is the Father who establishes us in Christ, who 
gives, in a daily fresh giving, the Holy Spirit ; it 
is to the Father, the Holy Father, the soul must 
look up continually in the prayer, " Make me holy 
in the truth." 

It has been well said that in the word Holy we 
have the central thought of the high -priestly 
prayer. As the Father's attribute (John xvii. 11), 
as the Son's work for Himself and us (ver. 19), as 
the direct work of the Father through the Spirit 
(vers. 17, 20), it is the revelation of the glory of 
God in Himself and in us. Let us enter into the 
Holiest of all, and as we bow with our Great High 
Priest, let the deep, unceasing cry go up for all 
the Church of God, "Holy Father! make them 
holy in the truth : Thy word is truth." The word 
in which God makes holy is summed up in this, 
Holy in Christ. May God make it truth in us ! 

Be ye holy, as I am holy. 



Blessed Father! to Israel Thou didst say, I the 
Lord am holy and make holy. But it is only in 
Thy beloved Son that the full glory of thy Holi- 



HOLINESS AND TRUTH, 171 

ness, as making us holy, has been revealed. Thou 
art our Holy Father, who makest us holy in Thy 
truth. 

We thank Thee that Thy Son hath given us the 
words Thou gavest Him, and that as He received 
them from Thee in life and power, we may receive 
them too. O Father ! with our whole heart we do 
receive them : let the Spirit make them truth and 
life within us. So shall we know Thee as the 
Holy One, consuming the sin, renewing the sinner. 

We bless Thee most for Thy Blessed Son, the 
Holy One of God, the Living Word in whom the 
Truth dwelleth. We thank Thee that in His 
never-ceasing intercession, this cry ever reacheth 
Thee, " Father, sanctify them in Thy Truth," and 
that the answer is ever streaming forth from Thy 
glory. Holy Father! make us holy in Thy truth, 
in Thy wonderful revelation of Thyself in Him 
who is the truth. Let Thy Holy Spirit so have 
dominion in our hearts that Thy Holy Child 
Jesus, sanctifying Himself for us that we may be 
sanctified in the truth, may be to us the Way, the 
Truth, and the Life. May we know that we are 
in Him in Thy presence, and that Thy one word 
in answer to our prayer to make us holy is — Holy 
in Christ. Amen. 

1. God is the God of truth — not truth in speaking only, or 
truth of doctrine — but truth of existence, or life in its Divine 



172 HOLY IJSr CUBIST, 

reality. And Christ is the truth; the actual embodiment of 
this Divine life. And there is a kingdom of truth, of Divine 
Spiritual realities, of which Christ is King. And of all this 
truth of God in Christ, the very essence is, the Spirit. He is 
the Spirit of truth : He leads us into it, so that we are of the 
truth and walk in it. Of the truth, the reality there is in God, 
Holiness, is the deepest root ; the Spirit of truth is the Holy 
Spirit. 

2. It is the work of the Father to make us holy in the truth : 
let us bow very low in childlike trust as we breathe the prayer: 
" Holy Father ! make us holy in the truth.'' He will do it. 

3. It is the intercession of the Son that asks and obtains this 
blessing : let us take our place in Him, and rejoice in the assur- 
ance of an answer. 

4. It is the Spirit of truth through whom the Father does this 
work, so that we dwell in the truth, and the truth in us. Let 
us yield very freely and very fully to the leading of the Spirit, 
in our intercourse with God's Word, that, as the Son pray^, the 
J'ather may make us holy in the truth. 

5. Let us, in the light of this work of the Three-One,, never 
read the Word but with this aim : to be made holy in the truth 
bj God. 



HOLINESS AND CRUCIFIXION 175 



SEVENTEENTH DAY. 



HOLY IN CHRIST. 
1bollne66 anD Ctucit!j:fon^ 

"For their sakes I sanctify myself, that they themselves also- 
may be sanctified in truth." — John xvii. 19. 

*'He said, Lo, I am come to do Thy will. In which will we 
have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus 
once for all. For by one offering He hath perfected for ever 
them that are sanctified." — Heh, x. 9, 10, 14. 

IT was in His High-priestly prayer, on His way 
to Gethsemane and Calvary, that Jesus thus 
spake to the Father : " I sanctify myself." He had 
not long before spoken of Himself as ^* the Son 
whom the Father hath sanctified and sent into the 
world." From the language of Holy Scripture we 
are familiar with the thought that, what God has 
sanctified, man has to sanctify too. The work of 
the Father, in sanctifying the Son, is the basis and 
groundwork of the work of the Son in sanctifying 
Himself. If His Holiness as man was to be a free 
and personal possession, accepted and assimilated 



174 HOLT IN CHRIST. 

in voluntary and conscious self-determination, it 
was not enough that the Father sanctify Him : 
He must sanctify Himself too. 

This self-sanctifying of our Lord found place 
through His whole life, but culminates and comes 
out in special distinctness in His crucifixion. 
Wherein it consists is made clear by the words 
from the Epistle to the Hebrews. The Messiah 
spake : ^' Lo, I come to do Thy will." And then 
it is added, "In the which will we have been 
sanctified through the offering of the body of 
Christ." It was the off'ering of the body of Christ 
that was the will of God: in doing that will He 
sanctified us. It was of the doing that will in 
the ofl*ering His body that He spake, " I sanctify 
myself, that they themselves also may be sancti- 
fied in truth." The giving up of His will to 
God's will in the agony of Gethsemane, and then 
the doing of that will in the obedience unto 
death, this was Christ's sanctifying Himself and 
us too. Let us try and understand this. 

The Holiness of God is revealed in His will. 
Holiness even in the Divine Being has no moral 
value except as it is freely willed. In speaking 
of the Trinity, theologians have pointed out how, 
as the Father represents the absolute necessity of 
Everlasting Goodness, the Son proves its liberty : 
within the Divine Being it is willed in love. And 



HOLINESS AND CRUCIFIXION 175 

this now was the work of the Son on earth, amid 
the trials and temptations of a human life, lo ac- 
cept and hold fast at any sacrifice, with His whole 
heart to will, the will of the Father. " Though 
He was a Son, yet He learned obedience in that 
He suffered." In (rethsemane the conflict between 
the will of human nature and the Divine will 
reached its height : it manifests itself in language 
which almost makes us tremble for His sinless- 
ness, as He speaks of His will in antithesis to 
God's will. But the struggle is a victory, because 
in presence of the clearest consciousness of what 
it means to have His own will. He gives it up, 
and says, '' Thy will be done." To enter into the 
will of God He gives up His very life. In His 
crucifixion He thus reveals the law of sanctifica- 
tion. Holiness is the full entrance of our will 
into God's will. Or rather. Holiness is the en- 
trance of God's will to be the death of our will. 
The only end of our will and deliverance from it, 
is death to it under the righteous judgment of 
God. It was in the surrender to the death of the 
cross that Christ sanctified Himself, and sanctified 
us, that we also might be sanctified in truth. 

And now, just as the Father sanctified Him, 
and He in virtue thereof appropriated it and 
sanctified Himself, so we, whom He has sancti- 
fied, have to appropriate it to ourselves. In no 



176 EOLT m GHBI8T, 

other way than crucifixion, the giving up of Him 
self to the death, could Christ realize the sanctifi 
.cation He had from the Father. And in no other 
way can we realize the sanctification we have in 
Him. His own and our sanctification bears the 
common stamp of the cross. We have seen be- 
fore that obedience is the path to holiness. In 
Christ we see that the path to perfect holiness is 
perfect obedience. And that is obedience unto to 
death, even to the giving up of life, even the 
death of the cross. As the sanctification which 
Christ wrought out for us, even unto the offering 
of His body, bears the death mark, we cannot 
partake of it, we cannot enter it, except as w^e die 
to self and its will. Crucifixion is the path to 
sanctification. 

This lesson is in harmony with all we have 
seen. The first revelation of God's Holiness to 
Moses was accompanied with the command. Put 
ofl*. God's praise, as Glorious in Holiness, Fearful 
in Praises, was sounded over the dead bodies of 
the Egyptians. When Moses on Sinai was com- 
manded to sanctify the Mount, it was said, " If 
any touch it, man or beast, it shall not live.'^ 
The Holiness of God is death to all that is in con- 
tact with sin. Only through death, through 
blood-shedding, was there access to the Holiest of 
all. Christ chose death, even death as a curse. 



HOLINESS AND CRUCIFIXION 177 

that He might sanctify Himself for us, and open 
to us the path to Holiness, to the Holiest of all, to 
the Holy One. And so it is still. No man can 
see God and live. It is only in death, the death 
of self and of nature, that we can draw near and 
behold God. Christ led the way. No man can 
see God and live. " Then let me die, Lord," one 
has cried, " but see Thee I must." Yes, blessed 
be God, so real is our interest in Christ and our 
union to Him, that we may live in His death; 
as day by day self is kept in the place of death, 
the life and the holiness of Christ can be ours.^ 

And where is the place of Death? And how 
can the crucifixion which leads to Holiness and 
to God be accomplished in us? Thank God ! it 
is no work of our own, no weary process of self- 
crucifixion. The crucifixion that is to sanctify us 
is an accomplished fact. The cross bears the 
banner, "It is finished." On it Christ sanctified 
Himself for us, that we might be sanctified in 
truth. Our crucifixion, as our sanctification, is 
something that in Christ has been completel}^ 
and perfectly finished. " We have been sanctified 
through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ 
once for all." " By one offering He hath perfected 
for ever them that are sanctified." In that ful- 
ness, which it is the Father's good pleasure should 

1 See Note D. 
12 



178 HOLT m CHRIST, 

dwell in Christ, the crucifixion of our old man, ' 
of the flesh, of the world, of ourselves, is all a 
spiritual reality ; he that desires and knows and 
accepts Christ, fully receives all this in Him. 
And as the Christ, who had previously been 
known more in His pardoning, quickening, and 
saving grace, is again sought after as a real 
deliverer from the power of sin, as a sanctifier, 
He comes and takes up the soul into the fellow- 
ship of the sacrifice of His will. " He put away 
sin by the sacrifice of Himself ^^^ must become true 
of us as it is of Him. He reveals how it is a part 
of His salvation to make us partakers of a will 
entirely given up to the will of God, of a life that 
had yielded itself to the death, and had then 
been given back from the dead by the power of 
God, a life of which the crucifixion of self-will 
was the spirit and the power. He reveals this, 
and the soul that sees it, and consents to it, and 
yields its will and its life, and believes in Jesus as 
its death and its life, and in His crucifixion as its 
possession and its inheritance, enters into the enjoy- 
ment and experience of it. The language is now, 
^' I died that I might live : I have been cruci- 
fied with Christ, and it is no longer I that live, 
but Christ that liveth in me." And the life it 
now lives is by the faith on the Son of God, the 
daily acceptance in faith of Him who lives within 



HOLINESS AND CBUCIFIXION. 179 

US in the power of a death that has been passed 
through and for ever finished. 

'' I sanctify myself for them, that they them- 
selves also may be sanctified in truth." " I come 
to do Thy will, God. In the which will," the 
will of God accomplished by Christ, "we have 
been sanctified through the one offering of the 
body of Christ." Let us understand and hold it 
fast : Christ's giving up His will in Gethsemane 
and accepting God's will in dying ; Christ's doing 
that will in the obedience to the death of the 
cross, this is His sanctifying Himself, and this is 
our being sanctified in truth. '* In the which will 
we have been sanctified." The death to self, the 
utter and most absolute giving up of our own life, 
with its will and its power and its aims, to the 
cross, and into the crucifixion of Christ, the daily 
bearing the cross — not a cross on which we are 
yet to be crucified, but the cross of the crucified 
Christ in its power to kill and make dead — this is 
the secret of the life of holiness — this is true sane- 
tification. 

Believer ! is this the holiness which you are 
seeking? Have you seen and consented that God 
alone is holy, that self is all unholy, and that 
there is no way to be made holy but for the fire 
of the Divine Holiness to come in and be the 
death of self? "Always bearing about in the 



180 HOLT m CHRIST. 

body the dying of Jesus, that the life also of 
Jesus may be manifested in our mortal body " — 
is the pathway for each one who seeks to be sanc- 
tified in truth, even as He sanctified Himself; 
sanctified just like Jesus. 

He sanctified Himself for us, that we ourselves 
also might be sanctified in truth. Yes, our sanc- 
tification rests and roots in His, in Himself. And 
we are in Him. The secret roots of our being are 
planted into Jesus : deeper down than we can see 
or feel, there is He our Vine, bearing and quicken- 
ing us. Let us by faith understand that, in a 
manner and a measure which are far beyond our 
comprehension, intensely Divine and real, we are 
in Him who sanctified Himself for us. Let us 
dwell there, where we have been placed of God. 
And let us bow our knees to the Father, that He 
would grant us to be mightily strengthened by 
His Spirit, that Christ as our Sanctification may 
dwell in our hearts, that the power of His death 
and His life may be revealed in us, and God's 
will be done in us as it was in Him. 

Be holy, for I am holy. 



Holy Father ! I do bless Thee for this precious 
blessed word, for this precious blessed work of 
Thy beloved Son. In His never-ceasing inter- 



HOLINESS AND CRUCIFIXION. 181 

cession Thou ever hearest the wonderful prayer, 
*' I sanctify myself for them, that they themselves 
also may be sanctified in truth." 

Blessed Father ! I beseech Thee to strengthen 
me mightily by Thy Spirit, that in living faith I 
may be able to accept and live the holiness pre- 
pared for me in my Lord Jesus. Give me spiritual 
understanding to know what it means that He 
sanctified Himself, that my sanctification is se- 
cured in His, that as by faith I abide in Him, its 
power will cover my whole life. Let His sanctifi- 
cation indeed be the law as it is the life of mine. 
Let His surrender to Thy fatherly will, His con- 
tinual dependence and obedience, be its root and 
its strength. Let His death to the world and to 
sin be its daily rule. Above all, let Himself^ O 
my Father ! let Himself, as sanctified for me, the 
living Jesus, be my only trust and stay. He 
sanctified Himself for me, that I myself also may 
be sanctified in truth. 

Beloved Saviour! how shall I rightly bless and 
love and glorify Thee for this wondrous grace! 
Thou didst give Thyself, so that now I am holy in 
Thee. I give myself, that in Thee I myself may 
be made holy in truth. Amen. Lord Jesus ! 
Amen. 

1. *' If any man would come after me, let him deny himself, 
and take up his cross, and follow me." Jesus means that our 



182 HOLT m CHRIST. 

life shall be the exact counterpart of His, including even the 
crucifixion. The beginning of such a life is the denial of self, 
to give Christ its place. The Jews would not deny self, but 
" denied the Holy One, and killed the Prince of Life/' The 
choice is still between Christ and self. Let us deny the unholy 
one, and give him to the death. 

2. The steps in this path are these : First, the deliberate de- 
cision that self shall be given up to the death ; then, the sur- 
render to Christ crucified to make us partakers of His cruci- 
fixion; then, "knowing that our old man is crucified,'* the 
faith that says, " I am crucified with Christ;'* and then, the 
power to live as a crucified one, to glory in the cross of Christ. 

3. This is God's way of holiness, a Divine mystery, which the 
Holy Spirit alone can daily maintain in us. Blessed be God, 
it is the life which a Christian can live, because Christ lives in 
us. 

4. The central thought is : We are in Christ, who gave up 
His will and did the will of God. By the Holy Spirit the mind 
that was in Him is in us, the will of self is crucified, and we 
live in the will of God. 



HOLINESS AND FAITH. 183 



EIGHTEENTH DAY. 



HOLY IN CHRIST. 
IboUnees anD jfaitb* 

"That they may receive remission of sins, and an inheritance 
among them that are sanctified by faith in me/' — Acts xxvi. 18. 

THE more we study Scripture in the light of 
the Holy Spirit, or practise the Christian life 
in His power, the deeper becomes our conviction 
of the unique and central place faith has in God's 
plan of salvation. And we learn, too, to see that 
it is meet and right that it should be so : the very 
nature of things demands it. Because God is a 
Spiritual and Invisible Being, every revelation of 
Himself, whether in Hia works. His word, or His 
Son, calls for faith. Faith is the spiritual sense 
of the soul, being to it what the senses are to the 
body ; by it alone we enter into communication 
and contact with God. 

Faith is that meekness of soul which waits in 
stillness to hear, to understand, to accept what 



184 HOLY IN CHRIST. 

God says ; to receive, to retain, to possess what 
God gives or works. By faith we allow, we wel- 
come God Himself, the Living Person, to enter in 
to make His abode with us, to become our very 
life. However well we think we know it, we al- 
ways have to learn the truth afresh, for a deeper 
and fuller application of it, that in the Christian 
life faith is the first thing, the one thing that 
pleases God, and brings blessing to us. And be- 
cause Holiness is God's highest glory, and the 
highest blessing He has for us, it is especially in 
the life of holiness that we need to live by faith 
alone. 

Our Lord speaks here of " them that are sancti- 
fied by faith in me." * He Himself is our Sancti- 
fication as He is our Justification : for the one as 
for the other it is faith that God asks, and both 
are equally given at once. The participle used 
here is not the present, denoting a process or work 
that is being carried on, but the aorist, indicating 
an act done once for all. When we believe in 
Christ, we receive the whole Christ, our justifica- 

1 The best commentators connect the expression, "by faith in 
me/* not with the word " sanctified/' but with the whole clause, 
*' that by faith in me they may receive.*' This will, however, 
in no way affect the application to the word sanctified. Thus 
read, the text tells us that the remission of sin, and the inherit- 
ance, and the sanctification which qualifies for the inheritance, 
are all received bv faith. 



HOLINESS AND FAITH. 185 

tion and our sanctification : we are at once ac- 
cepted by God as righteous in Him, and as holy 
in Him. God counts and calls us, what we really 
are, sanctified ones in Christ. It is as we are led 
to see what God sees, as our faith grasps that the 
holy life of Christ is ours in actual possession, to 
be accepted and appropriated for daily use, that 
we shall really be able to live the life God calls us 
to, the life of holy ones in Christ Jesus. We 
shall then be in the right position in which what 
is called our progressive sanctification can be 
worked out. It will be, the acceptance and appli- 
cation in daily life of the power of a holy life 
which has been prepared in Jesus, which has in 
the union with Him become our present and per- 
manent possession, and which works in us accord- 
ing to the measure of our faith/ 

From this point of view it is evident that faith 
has a twofold operation. Faith is the evidence of 
things not seen, though now actually existing, the 
substance of things hoped for, but not yet 'present. 
It deals with the unseen present, as well as with 
the unseen future. As the evidence of things not 
seen, it rejoices in Christ our complete sanctifica- 
tion, as a present possession. Through faith I 
simply look to what Christ is, as revealed in the 
Word by the Holy Spirit. Claiming all He is as 
1 See Note E. 



186 HOLY IN CHBI8T. 

my own, I know that His Holiness, His holy 
nature and life, are mine ; I am a holy one : by 
fiaith in Him I have been sanctified. This is the 
first aspect of sanctification : it looks to what is a 
complete and finished thing, an absolute reality. 
As the substance of things hoped for, this faith 
reaches out in the assurance of hope to the future, 
to things I do not yet see or experience, and 
claims, day by day, out of Christ our sanctifica- 
tion, what it needs for practical holiness, '' to be 
holy in all manner of living." This is the second 
aspect of sanctification : I depend upon Jesus to 
supply, in personal experience, gradually and un- 
ceasingly, for the need of each moment, what has 
been treasured up in His fulness. " Of God are 
ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us 
sanctification." Under its first aspect faith says, 
I know I am in Him, and all His Holiness is 
mine ; in its second aspect it speaks, I trust in 
Him for the grace and the strength I need each 
moment to live a holy life. 

And yet, it need hardly be said, these two are 
one. It is one Jesus who is our sanctification, 
whether we look at it in the light of what He is 
made for us once for all, or what, as the fruit of 
that, He becomes to our experience day by day. 
And so it is one faith which, the more it studies 
and adores and rejoices in Jesus as made of God 



HOLTNESS AND FAITH. 187 

unto us sanctification, as Him in whom we have 
been sanctified, becomes the bolder to expect the 
fulfilment of every promise for daily life, and the 
stronger to claim the victory over every sin. 
Faith in Jesus is the secret of a holy life: all 
holy conduct, all really holy deeds, are the fruit 
of faith in Jesus as our holiness. 

We know how faith acts, and what its great 
hindrances are, in the matter of justification. It 
is well that we remind ourselves that there are 
the same dangers in the exercise of sanctifying as 
of justifying faith. Faith in God stands opposed 
to trust in self: specially to its willing and work- 
ing. Faith is hindered by every effort to do 
something ourselves. Faith looks to God work- 
ing, and yields itself to His strength, as revealed 
in Christ through the Spirit; it allows God to 
work both to will and to do. Faith must work; 
without works it is dead, by works alone can it be 
perfected ; in Jesus Christ, as Paul says, nothing 
avails but '' faith working by love." But these 
works, which faith in God's working inspires and 
performs, are very different from the works in 
which a believer often puts forth his best efforts^ 
only to find that he fails. The true life of holi- 
ness, the life of them who are sanctified in Christ, 
has its root and its strength in an abiding sense 
of utter impotence, in the deep restfulness which 



188 HOLY IN CHRIST, 

trusts to the working of a Divine power and life, 
in the entire personal surrender to the loving 
Saviour, in that faith which consents to be notb 
ing, that He may be all. It may appear impossi- 
ble to discern or describe the difference between 
the working that is of self and the working that 
is of Christ through faith: if we but know that 
there is such a difference, if we learn to distrust 
ourselves, and to count on Christ working, the 
Holy Spirit will lead us into this secret of the 
Lord too. Faith's works are Christ's works. 

And as by effort, so faith is also hindered by 
the desire to see and feel. '' If thou believest, 
thou shalt see;" the Holy Spirit wall seal our 
faith with a Divine experience ; we shall see the 
glory of God. But this is His work: ours is, 
when all appears dark and cold, in the face of all 
that nature or experience testifies, still each 
moment to believe in Jesus as our all-sufficient 
sanctification, in whom we are perfected before 
God. Complaints as to want of feeling, as to 
weakness or deadness, seldom profit : it is the 
soul that refuses to occupy itself with itself, either 
with its own weakness or the strength of the 
enemy, but only looks to what Jesus is, and has 
promised to do, to whom progress in holiness will 
be a joyful march from victory to victory. "The 
Lord Himself doth fight for you ; " this thought, ' 



HOLINESS AND FAITH. 189» 

so often repeated in connection with Israel's pos- 
session of the promised land, is the food of faith: 
in conscious weakness, in presence of mighty ene- 
mies, it sings the conqueror's song. When God 
appears to be not doing what we trusted Him for^ 
then is just the time for faith to glory in Him. 

There is perhaps nothing that more reveals the 
true character of faith than joy and praise. You 
give a child the promise of a present to-morrow : 
at once it says, Thank you, and is glad. The joy- 
ful thanks are the proof of how really your 
promise has entered the heart. You are told by 
a friend of a rich legacy he has left you in his 
will: it may not come true for years, but even 
now it makes you glad. We have already seen 
what an element of holiness joy is : it is especially 
an element of holiness by faith. Each time I 
really see how beautiful and how perfect God^s pro- 
vision is, by which my holiness is in Jesus, and 
by which I am to allow Him to work in me, my 
heart ought to rise up in praise and thanks. In- 
stead of allowing the thought that it is, after all, a 
life of such difficult attainment and such con- 
tinual self-denial, this life of holiness through 
faith, we ought to praise Him exceedingly that 
He has made it possible and sure for us : we can 
be holy, because Jesus the Mighty and the Loving 
One is our holiness. Praise will express our 



190 HOLT m C HEIST, 

faith ; praise will prove it; praise will strengthen 
it. "Then believed they His words; they sang 
His praise." Praise will commit us to faith : we 
shall see that we have but one thing to do, to go 
on in a faith that ever trusts and ever praises. It 
is in a living, loving attachment to Jesus, that 
rejoices in Him, and praises Him continually for 
what He is to us, tliat faith proves itself, and re- 
ceives the power of holiness. 

" Sanctified by faith in me." Yes, '^ by faith in 
M(6 ; " it is the personal living Jesus w^ho offers 
Himself, Himself in all the riches of His Power 
and Love, as the object, the strength, the life of 
our faith. He tells us that if we would be holy, 
always and in everything holy, we must just see 
to one thine : to be always and altogether full of 
faith in Him. Faith is the eye of the soul : the 
power by which we discern the presence of the 
Unseen One, as He comes to give Himself to us. 
Faith not only sees, but appropriates and assimi- 
lates : let us set our souls very still for the Holy 
Spirit who dwells in us, to quicken and strengthen 
that faith, for which He has been given us. Faith 
is surrender : yielding ourselves to Jesus to allow 
Him to do His work in us, giving up ourselves to 
Him to live out His life and work out His will in 
us, we shall find Him giving Himself entirely to 
us, and taking complete possession. So faith will 



HOLINESS AND FAITH. 191 

be power: the power of obedience to do God's 
v/ill : " our most holy faith," '' the faith delivered 
to the holy ones." And we shall understand how 
simple, to the single-hearted, is the secret of holi- 
ness : just Jesus. We are in Him, our Sanctifi ca- 
tion : He personally is our Holiness; and the life 
of faith in Him, that receives and possesses Him, 
must necessarily be a life of holiness. Jesus says, 
''Sanctified by faith in me." 

Be ye holy, as I am holy. 



Beloved Lord ! again have I seen, with adoring 
wonder, what Thou art willing to be to me. It is 
in Thyself, and a life of living fellowship with 
Thyself, that I am to become holy. It is in the 
simple life of personal attachment, of trust and 
love, of surrender and consecration, that Thou 
dost become my all, and make me partaker of 
Thyself and Thy Holiness. 

Blessed Lord Jesus ! I do believe in. Thee, help 
Thou mine unbelief. I confess what still remains 
of unbelief, and count on Thy presence to conquer 
and cast it out. My soul is opening up con- 
tinually to see more how Thou Thyself art my 
LiTe and my Holiness. Thou art enlarging my 
heart to rejoice in Thyself as my all, and to be as- 



192 HOLT m CHRIST. 

sured that Thou dost Thyself take possession and 
fill the temple of my being with Thy glory. Thou 
art teaching me to understand that, however 
feeble and human and disappointing experiences 
may be, Thy Holy Spirit is the strength of my 
faith, leading me on to grow up into a stronger 
and a larger conj&dence in Thee in whom I am 
holy. O my Saviour ! I take Thy word this day, 
" Sanctified by faith in me," as a new revelation 
of Thy Love and its purpose with me. In Thee 
Thyself is the Power of my holiness ; in Thee is 
the Power of my faith. Blessed be Thy name 
that Thou hast given me too a place among them 
of whom Thou speakest : " Sanctified by faith in 
me." Amen. 

1. Let us remember that it is not only the faith that is deal- 
ing specially with Christ for sanctificatiou, but all living faith, 
that has the power to sanctify. Anything that casts the soul 
wholly on Jesus, that calls forth intense and simple trust, be it 
the trial of faith, or the prayer of faith, or the work of fnith 
helps to make us holy, because it brings us into living contact 
with the Holy One. 

2. It is only through the Holy Spirit that Christ and His 
Holiness are day by day revealed and made ours in actual 
possession. And so the faith which receives Him is of the 
Spirit too. Yield yourself in simplicity and trust to His work- 
ing. Do not be afraid, as if you cannot believe : you have " the 
Spirit of faith *' within you : you have the power to believe. 
And you may ask God to strengthen you mightily by His Spirit 
in the inner man, for the faith that receives Christ in the in- 
dwelling that knows no break. 



HOLINESS AND FAITH. 193 

3. I have only so much of faith as I have of the Spirit. Is 
not this theu what I most need — to live entirely under the in- 
fluence of the Spirit ? 

4. Just as the eye in seeing is receptive, and yields to let the 
object placed before it make its impression, so faith is the im- 
pression God makes on the soul when He draws nigh. Was 
not the faith of Abraham the fruit of God's drawing near and 
speaking to him, the impression God made on him ? Let us be 
still to gaze on the Divine mystery of Christ our holiness : His 
Presence, waited for and worshipped, will work the faith. 
That is, the Spirit that proceeds from Him into those who 
cling to Him, will be faith. 

5. Holiness by faith in Jesus, not by effort of thine own, 
Sin's dominion crushed and broken hy the power of grace 

alone, — 
God's own holiness within thee, His own beauty on thy 

brow, — 
This shall be thy pilgrim brightness, this thy blessed portion 

now, 

F. R. H. 



13 



194 HOLT m CHRIST, 



NINETEENTH DAY. 



HOLY IN CHRIST. 
1boltne00 anD IReeurrection* 

** The Son of God, who was born of the seed of David accord- 
ing to the fleshy who was declared to be the Son of God with 
power, according to the Spirit of holiness, by the resurrection 
of the dead." — Rom. i. 4. 

THESE words speak of a twofold birth of 
Christ. According to the flesh, He was born 
of the seed of David. According to the Spirit, 
He was the first begotten from the dead. As He 
was a Son of David in virtue of His birth through 
the flesh, so He was declared to be the Son of 
God with power, in virtue of His resurrection- 
birth through the Spirit of holiness. As the life 
He received through His first birth was a life in 
and after the flesh with its weakness, so the new 
life He received in the resurrection was a life in 
the power of the Spirit of holiness. 

The expression, the Spirit of holiness, is a 
peculiar one. It is not the ordinary word for 



HOLmESS AND BESUBBEGTIOK 195 

God's Holiness that is here used as in Heb. xii. 
10, describing holiness in the abstract as the attri- 
bute of an object, but another word (also used in 
2 Cor. vii. 1 and 1 Thess, iii. 13) expressing the 
habit of holiness in its action — practical holiness 
or sanctity.^ Paul used this word, because He 
wished to emphasize the thought, that Christ's 
resurrection was distinctly the result of that life 
of holiness and self-sanctifying which had cul- 
minated in His death. It was the spirit of the 
life of holiness which He had lived, in the power 
of which He was raised again. He teaches us 
that that life and death of self-sanctification, in 
which alone our sanctification stands, was the 
root and ground of His resurrection, and of its 
declaration that He was the Son of God with 
power, the first begotten from the dead. The 
resurrection was the fruit which that Life of 
Holiness bore. 

And so the Life of Holiness becomes the 
property of all who are partakers of the resurrec- 
tion. The Resurrection Life and the Spirit of 
Holiness are inseparable. Christ sanctified Him- 
self in death, that we ourselves might be sanctified 
in truth : when in virtue of the Spirit of sanctity 
He was raised from the dead, that Spirit of holi- 
ness was proved to be the power of Resurrection 
1 See Note F. 



196 HOLT m CHRIST. 

Life, and the Resurrection Life to be a Life of 
Holiness. 

As a believer you have part in this Resurrection 
Life. You have been "begotten again by the 
resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead." You 
are " risen with Christ." You are commanded 
"to reckon yourself to be alive unto God in 
Christ Jesus." But the life can work in power 
only as you seek to know it, to yield to it, to let 
it have full possession and mastery. And if it is 
to do this, one of the most important things for 
you to realize is, that as it was in virtue of the 
Spirit of holiness that Christ was raised, so the 
Spirit of that same holiness must be in you the 
mark and the power of your life. Study to know 
and possess the Spirit of holiness as it was seen 
in the life of your Lord. 

And wherein did it consist? Its secret was, we 
are told: " Lo, I am come to do Thy Avill, O 
God." " In the which will," as done by Christ, 
" we have been sanctified by the one offering of 
the body of Jesus Christ." This was Christ's 
sanctifying Himself, in life and in death ; this 
was what the Spirit of holiness wrought in Him ; 
this is what the same Spirit, the Spirit of the life 
in Christ Jesus, will work in us : a life in the will 
of God is a life of holiness. Seek earnestly to 
grasp this clearly. Christ came to reveal what 



HOLINESS AND RESURRECTION. 197 

true holiness would be in the conditions of human 
life and weakness. He came to work it out for 
you, that He might communicate it to you by 
His Spirit. Except you intelligently apprehend 
and heartily accept it, the Spirit cannot work it 
in you. Do seek with your whole heart to take 
hold of it: the will of God unhesitatingly 
accepted, is the power of holiness. 

It is in this that any attempt to be holy as 
Christ is holy, with and in His Holiness, must 
have its starting-point. Many seek to take single 
portions of the life or image of Christ for imita- 
tion, and yet fail greatly in others. They have 
not seen that the self-denial, to which Jesus calls, 
really means the denial of self, in the full mean- 
ing of that word. In not one single thing is the 
will of self to be done : Jesus, as He did the will 
of the Father only, must rule, and not self. To 
" stand perfect and complete in all the will of 
God" must be the purpose, the prayer, the expec- 
tation of the disciple. There need be no fear that 
it is not possible to know the will of the Father 
in everything. "If any man will do, he shall 
know." The Father will not keep the willing 
child in ignorance of His will. As the surrender 
to the Spirit of holiness, to Jesus and the domin- 
ion of His holy life, becomes more simple, sin 
and self-will will be discovered, the spiritual 



198 HOLT m CHRIST. 

understanding will be opened up, and the law 
written in the inward parts become legible and 
intelligible. There need be no fear that it is not 
possible to do the will of the Father when it is 
known. When once the grief of failure and sin 
has driven the believer into the experience of 
Rom, vii., and the " delight in the law of God 
after the inward man " has proved its earnestness 
in the cry, " wretched man that I am," deliver- 
ance will come through Jesus Christ. The Spirit 
works not only to will but to do ; where the 
believer could only complain, '^ To perform that 
which is good, I find not," He gives the strength 
and song, " The law of the Spirit of life in Christ 
Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and 
death." 

In this faith, that it is possible to know and do 
the will of God in all things, take over from Him, 
in whom alone you are holy, as your life-princi- 
ple; " I come to do Thy will, O God." It is the 
principle of the resurrection life : without it 
Jesus had never been raised again. It is the 
principle of the new life in you. Accept it ; 
study it ; realize it ; act it out. Many a believer 
has found that some simple words of dedication, 
expressive of the purpose in everything to do 
God's will, have been an entrance into the joy 
and power of the resurrection life previously un- 



HOLINESS AND MESUBBECTION 199 

known. The will of God is the complete expres- 
sion of His moral perfection, His Divine Holi- 
ness. To take one's place in the centre of thai 
will, to live it out, to be borne and sustained by 
it, was the power of that life of Jesus that could 
not be held of death, that could not but burst 
out in resurrection glory. What it was to Jesus 
it will be to us. 

Holiness is Life: this is the simplest expression 
of the truth our text teaches. There can be no 
holiness until there be a new life implanted. The 
new life cannot grow and break forth in resurrec- 
tion power, cannot bring forth fruit, but as it grows 
in holiness. As long as the believer is living the 
mixed life, part in the flesh and part in the spirit, 
with some of self and some of Christ, he seeks in 
vain for holiness. It is the New Life that is the 
holy life: the full apprehension of it in faith, the 
full surrender to it in conduct, will be the high- 
way of holiness. Jesus lived and died and rose 
again to prepare for us a new nature, to be received 
day by day in the obedience of faith : we " have 
put on the new man, which after God is created in 
righteousness and true holiness." Let the inner 
life, hid with Christ in God, hid also deep in the 
recesses of our inmost being, be acknowledged, be 
waited on, be yielded to, it will work itself out in 
all the beauties of holiness. 



200 HOLY IJSr CHRIST. 

There is more. This life is not like the life of 
nature, a blind, non-conscious principle, involun- 
tarily working out its ideal in unresisting obedi- 
ence to the law of its being. There is the Spirit 
of the holy life in Christ Jesus — the Spirit of holi- 
ness — the Holy Spirit dwelling in us as a Divine 
Person, entering into fellowship with us, and lead- 
ing us into the fellowship of the Living Christ. 
It is this fills our life with hope and joy. The 
Risen Saviour breathed the Holy Spirit on His 
disciples : the Spirit brings the Risen One into the 
field, into our hearts, as a personal friend, as a 
Living Guide and Strengthener. The Spirit of 
holiness is the Spirit, the Presence, and the Power 
of the Living Christ. Jesus said of the Spirit, 
"Ye know Him." Is not our great need to know 
this Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Christ, of His Holi- 
ness and of ours? How can we "walk after the 
Spirit " and follow His leading, if we know not 
Him and His voice and His way? 

Let us learn one more lesson from our text. It 
is out of the grave of the flesh and the will of self that 
the Spirit of holiness breaks out in resurrection power. 
We must accept death to the flesh, death to self 
with its willing and working, as the birthplace of 
our experience of the power of the Spirit of holi- 
ness. In view of each struggle wdth sin, in each 
exercise of faith or prayer, we must enter into the 



HOLINESS AND RESURRECTION 201 

death of Jesus, the death to self, and as those who 
say, '' we are not sufficient to think anything as 
of ourselves," in quiet faith expect the Spirit of 
Christ to do His work. The Spirit will work, 
strengthening you mightily in the inner man, and 
building up within you an holy temple for the 
Lord. And the time will come, if it has not come 
to you yet, and it may be nearer than you dare 
hope, when the conscious indwelling of Christ in 
your heart by faith, the full revelation and en- 
thronement of Him as ruler and keeper of heart 
and life, shall have become a personal experience. 
According to the Spirit of holiness, by the resur- 
rection from the dead, will the Son of God be de- 
clared with power in the kingdom that is within 
you. 

Be ye holy, for I am holy. 



Most Holy Lord God ! we do bless Thee that 
Thou didst raise Thy Son from the dead and give 
Him glory, that our faith and hope might be in 
Thee. Thou didst make His resurrection the 
power of eternal life in us, and now-, even as He 
was raised, so we may walk in newness of life. 
As the Spirit of holiness dwelt and wrought in 
Him, it dwells and works in us, and becomes in 
us the Spirit of life. 



202 HOLT m CHBI8T. 

God ! we beseech Thee to perfect Thy work in 
Thy saints. Give them a deeper sense of the holy 
calling with which Thou hast called them in 
Christ, the Risen One. Give all to accept the 
Spirit of His life on earth, delight in the will of ^ 
God, as the spirit of their life. May those who 
have never yet fully accepted this be brought to 
do it, and in faith of the power of the new life to 
say, I accept the will of God as my only law. 
May the Spirit of holiness be the spirit of their 
lives ! 

Father! we beseech Thee, let Christ thus, in 
ever increasing experience of His resurrection 
power, be revealed in our hearts as the Son of 
God, Lord and Ruler within us. Let His life 
within inspire all the outer life, so that in the 
home and society, in thought and speech and 
action, in religion and in business. His life may 
shine out from us in the beauty of holiness. Amen. 

1. Scripture regards the resurrection in two different aspects. 
In one view, it is the title to the new life, the source of our jus- 
tification. Rom. iv. 25; 1 Cor. xv. 17. In another it is our 
regeneration, the power of the new life working in us, the source 
of our sanctification. Rom. vi. 4; 1 Pet. i. 3. Pardon and 
holiness are inseparable ; they have the same source, union with 
the Risen Living Christ. 

2. The blessedness to the disciples of having a Risen Christ 
was this: He, whom they thought dead, came and revealed 
Himself to them. Christ lives to reveal Himself to thee and to 



HOLINESS AND RESURRECTION. 203 

me ; wait on Him, trust Him for this. He will reveal Himself 
to thee as thy sanctification. See to it that thou hast Him in 
living possession, aud thou hast His Holiness. 

3. The life of Christ is the holiness of Christ. The reason we 
so often fail in the pursuit of holiness is that the old life, the 
flesh, in its own strength seeks for holiness as a beautiful gar- 
ment to wear and enter heaven with. 'It is the daily death to 
self out of which the life of Christ rises up. 

4. To die thus, to live thus in Christ, to be holy — how can we 
attain it? It all comes ^^ according to the Spirit of holiness.'* 
Have the Holy Spirit within thee. Say daily, ** I believe in the 
Holy Ghost.'^ 

5. Holy in Christ. When Christ lives in us, and His mind, 
as it found expression in His words and work on earth, enters 
and fills our will and personal consciousness, then our union 
with Him becomes what He meant it to be. It is the Spirit of 
His holy conduct, the Spirit of His sanctity, must be in us. 



204 HOLY IN CHRIST. 



TWENTIETH DAY. 



HOLY IN CHRIST. 
IboUneea anD Xlbcrti?* 

" Being m2ide free from sin ^ ye became servants of righteous- 
ness : DOW present your members as servants of righteousness 
unto sanctification. Now being made free from sin, and be- 
come servants unto God, ye have your fruit unto sanctification^ 
and the end eternal life.'' — Bom. vi. 18, 19, 22. 

*' Our liberty which we have in Christ Jesus.'' — Gal. ii. 4. 

" With freedom did Christ set us free : stand fast therefore, 
and be not entangled again in a yoke of bondage.'' — Gal. v. 1. 

THERE is no possession more precious or price- 
less than liberty. There is nothing more in- 
spiring and elevating ; nothing, on the other hand, 
more depressing and degrading than slavery. It 
robs a man of what constitutes his manhood, the 
power of self-decision, self-action, of being and 
doing what he would. 

Sin is slavery ; the bondage to a foreign power 
that has obtained the mastery over us, and com- 



HOLINESS AND LIBERTY. 20^ 

pels often a most reluctant service. The redemp- 
tion of Christ restores our liberty and sets us free 
from the power of sin. If we are truly to live as 
redeemed ones, we need not only to look at the 
work Christ did to accomplish our redemption, 
but to accept and realize fully how complete, how 
sure, how absolute the liberty is wherewith He 
hath made us free. It is only as we " %tand fast 
in our liberty in Christ Jesus," that we can have 
our fruit unto sanctification. 

It is remarkable how seldom the word holy 
occurs in the great argument of the Epistle to the 
Romans, and how, where twice used in chap. vi. 
in the expression '^ unto sanctification," it is dis- 
tinctly set forth as the aim and fruit to be reached 
through a life of righteousness. The twice re- 
peated " unto sanctification," pointing to a result 
to be obtained, is preceded by a twice repeated 
" being made free from sin and become servants 
of righteousness." It teaches us how the liberty 
from the power of sin and the surrender to the 
service of righteousness are not yet of themselves 
holiness, but the sure and only path by which it 
can be reached. A true insight and a full enter- 
ing into our freedom from sin in Christ are in- 
dispensable to a life of holiness. It was when 
Israel was freed from Pharaoh that God began to* 
reveal Himself as the Holy One : it is as we know 



206 HOLY m CHBIST, 

ourselves " freed from sin," delivered from the 
band of all our enemies, that we shall serve God 
in righteousness and holiness all the days of our 
life. 

" Being made free from sin: " to understand this 
word aright, we must beware of a twofold error. 
We must neither narrow it down to less, nor im- 
port into it more, than the Holy Spirit means by 
it here. Paul is speaking neither of an imputa- 
tion nor an experience. We must not limit it to 
being made free from the curse or punishment of 
sin. The context shows that he is speaking, 
not of our judicial standing, but of a spiritual 
reality, our being in living union with Christ in 
His death and resurrection, and so being entirely 
taken out from under the dominion or power of 
sin. ''Sin shall not have dominion over you." 
Nor is he as yet speaking of an experience, that 
we feel that we are free from all sin. He speaks 
of the great objective fact, Christ's have finally de- 
livered us from the power which sin had to com- 
pel us to do its wdll and its w^orks, and urges us, 
in the faith of this glorious fact, boldly to refuse 
to listen to the bidding or temptation of sin. To 
know our liberty which we have in Christ, our 
freedom from sin's mastery and power, is the way 
to realize it as an experience. 

In olden times, when Turks or Moors often 



HOLINESS AND LIBERTY. 207 

made slaves of Christians, large sums were fre- 
quently paid for the ransom of those who were in 
bondage. But it happened more than once, away 
in the interior of the slave country, that the 
ransomed ones never got the tidings ; the masters 
were only too glad to keep it from them. Others, 
again, got the tidings, but had grown too accus- 
tomed to their bondage to rouse themselves for 
the effort of reaching the coast. Slothfulness or 
hopelessness kept them in slavery; they could 
not believe that they w^ould be able ever in safety 
to reach the land of liberty. The ransom had 
been paid; in truth they were free; and yet in 
their experience, by reason of ignorance or want 
of courage, they were still in bondage. Christ's 
redemption has so completely made an end of sin 
and the legal power it had over us, — for " the 
strength of sin is the law," — that in very deed, in 
the deepest reality, sin has no power to compel 
our obedience. It is only as we allow it again to 
reign, as we yield ourselves again as its servants, 
tliat it can exercise the mastery. Satan does his 
"^ utmost to keep believers in ignorance of the com- 
pleteness of this their freedom from his slavery. 
And because believers are so content with their 
own thoughts of what redemption means, and so 
little long and plead to see it and possess it in its 
fulness of deliverance and blessing, the experience 



208 HOLY IN CHRIST. 

of the extent to which the freedom from sin can 
be realized is so feeble. " Where the Spirit of the 
Lord is, there is liberty." It is by the Holy 
Spirit, His light and leading within, humbly 
watched for and yielded to, that this liberty be- 
comes our possession. 

In the sixth chapter Paul speaks of freedom 
from sin, in chap. vii. (vers. 3, 4, 6) of freedom 
from the law, as both being ours in Christ and 
union with Him. In chap. viii. (ver. 2) he speaks 
of this freedom as become ours in experience. He 
says, " The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus 
hath made me free from the law of sin and death." 
The freedom which is ours in Christ, must become 
ours in personal appropriation and enjoyment 
through the Holy Spirit. The latter depends on 
the former : the fuller the faith, the clearer the 
insight, the more triumphant the glorying in 
Christ Jesus and the liberty with which He has 
made us free, the speedier and the fuller the en- 
trance into the glorious liberty of the children of 
God. As the liberty is in Christ alone, so it is 
the Spirit of Christ alone that makes it ours in 
practical possession, and keeps us dwelling in it: 
" the spirit of the life in Christ Jesus hath made me 
free from the law of sin and death." " Where the 
Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty." As the 
Spirit reveals Jesus to us as Lord and Master, the 



HOLINESS AND LIBERTY. 209 

new Master, who alone has ought to say over us, 
and leads us to yield ourselves, to present our 
members, to surrender our whole life to the service 
of God in Christ, our faith in the freedom from sin 
becomes a consciousness and a realization. Be- 
lieving in the completeness of the redemption, the 
captive goes forth as " the Lord's freedman." He 
knows now that sin has no longer power for one 
moment to command obedience. It may seek to 
assert its old right ; it may speak in the tone of 
authority ; it may frighten us into fear and sub- 
mission ; power it has none over us, except as we, 
forgetting our freedom, yield to its temptation, 
and ourselves give it power. 

We are the Lord's freedmen. " We have our 
liberty in Christ Jesus." In Rom, vii. Paul de- 
scribes the terrible struggles of the soul who still 
seeks to fulfil the law, but finds itself utterly 
helpless ; sold under sin, a captive and a slave, 
without the liberty to do what the whole heart 
desires. But when the Spirit takes the place of 
the l^w, the complaint, " O wretched man that I 
am," is changed into the song of victory : *' I 
thank God, through Jesus Christ, the law of the 
Spirit of life hath made me free." 

What numberless complaints of insufficient 
strength to do God's will, of unsuccessful effort 
and disappointed hopes, of continual failure, re- 
14 



210 HOLT IN CHRIST. 

echo in a thousand different forms the complaint 
of the captive, " wretched man that I am ! " 
Thank God! there is deliverance. "With free- 
dom did Christ set us free ! Stand fast therefore, 
and be not entangled again in a yoke of bondage." 
Satan is ever seeking to lay on us again the yoke 
either of sin or the law, to beget again the spirit 
of bondage, as if sin or the law with their demands 
somehow had power over us. It is not so : be 
not entangled; stand fast in the liberty with 
which Christ has made you free. Let us listen 
to the message : " Being made free from sin, ye 
became servants unto righteousness ; now yield 
your members servants to righteousness unto sane- 
tification,'''' " Having been made free from sin, and 
having been enslaved unto God, ye have your 
fruit unto sanctificationy To be holy, you must be 
free, perfectly free ; free for Jesus to rule you, to 
lead you ; free for the Holy Spirit to dispose of 
you, to breathe in you, to work His secret, gentle, 
but mighty work, so th;^t you may grow up unto 
all the liberty Jesus has won for you. The temple 
could not be sanctified by the indwelling of God, 
except as it was free from every other master and 
every other use, to be for Him and His service 
alone. The inner temple of our heart cannot be 
truly and fully sanctified, except as we are free 
from every other master and power, from every 



HOLINESS AND LIBERTY. 211 

yoke of bondage, or fear, or doubt, to let His 
Spirit lead us into the perfect liberty which has 
its fruit in true holiness. 

Being made free from sin, having become ser- 
vants unto righteousness, ye have your fruit unto 
holiness, and the end life everlasting. Freedom, 
Righteousness, Holiness — these are the steps on 
the way to the coming glory. The more deeply 
we enter by faith into our liberty, which we have 
in Christ, the more joyfully and confidently we pre- 
sent our members to God as instruments of right- 
eousness. The God is the Father whose will we 
delight to do, whose service is perfect liberty. 
The Redeemer is the Master, to whom love binds 
us in willing obedience. The liberty is not law- 
lessness : " we are delivered from our enemies, 
that we may serve Him in righteousness and holi- 
ness all the days of our life." ^ 

The liberty is the condition of the righteous- 
ness ; and this again of the holiness. The doing 
of God's will leads up into that fellowship, that 
heart sympathy with God Himself, out of which 
comes that reflection of the Divine presence, which 
is Holiness. Being made free from sin, being 
made the slaves of righteousness and of God, we 
have our fruit unto holiness, and the end — the 

1 See Note G. 



212 HOLT m CHRIST. 

fruit of holiness becomes, when ripe, the seed of 
— everlasting life. 

Be ye holy, as I am holy. 



Most glorious God ! I pray Thee to open my 
eyes to this wonderful liberty with which Christ 
has made me free. May I enter fully into Thy 
word, that sin shall have no dominion over me, 
because I am not under the law but under grace. 
May I know my liberty which I have in Christ 
Jesus, and stand fast in it. 

Father ! Thy service is perfect liberty : reveal 
this too to me. Thou art the infinitely Free, and 
Thy will knows no limits but what its own perfec- 
tion has placed. And Thou invitest us into Thy 
will, that we may be free as Thou art. O my 
God ! show me the beauty of Thy will, as it frees 
me from self and from sin, and let it be my only 
blessedness. Let the service of righteousness so 
be a joy and a strength to me, having its fruit unto 
sanctification, leading me into Thy Holiness. 

Blessed Lord Jesus ! ni}^ Deliverer and my Lib- 
erty, I belong to Thee. I give myself to Tliy 
will, to know no will but Thine. Master! Thee 
and Thee alone would I serve. I have my liberty 
in Thee! be Thou my Keeper. I cannot stand 



HOLINESS AND LIBEBTT, 213 

for one moment out of Thee. In Thee I can stand 
fast : in Thee I put my trust. 

Most Holy God ! as Thy free, obedient, loving 
child, Thou wilt make me holy. Amen. 

1. Liberty is the power to carry out uahindered the impulse 
of our nature. In Christ the child of God is free from every 
power that could hinder his acting out the law of his new 
nature. 

2. This liberty is of faith. Gal. v. 5, 6. By faith in Christ I 
enter into it, and stand in it. 

3. This liberty is of the Holy Spirit. *' Where the Spirit of 
the Lord is, there is liberty." " If ye be led of the Spirit, ye 
are not under the law." A heart filled with the Spirit is made 
free indeed. But we are not made free that we may do our own 
will. No, made free to follow the leading of the Holy Spirit, 
*^ Where the Spirit is, there is liberty." 

4. This liberty is in love. *' Ye were called for freedom ; only 
use not your freedom for an occasion to the flesh, but through 
love be servants one to another." The freedom with Avhich the 
Son makes free is a freedom to become like Himself, to love and 
to serve. ** Though I was free from all men, I brought myself 
under bondage to all, that I might gain the more." This is the 
liberty of love. 

5. "Being made free from sin, ye became servants of right- 
eousness unto sanctification." ''Let my people go, that they 
may serve me." It is only the man that doeth righteousness 
that can become holy. 

6. This liberty is a thing of joy and singing. 

7. This liberty is the groundwork of holiness. The Redeemer 
who makes free is God the Holy One. As the Holy Spirit He 

' leads into the full possession of it. To be so free from every- 
thing that God can take complete possession, is to be holy. 



214 HOLT IN CHBI8T, 



TWENTY-FIRST DAY. 



HOLY IN CHRIST. 
1boline60 an^ Ibappineea^ 

" The kiogdom of God is joy in the Holy Ghost." — Rom, 
xiv. 17. 

" The disciples were filled with joy and the Holy Ghost." — 
Acts xiii. 52. 

" Then Nehemiah said, This day is holy unto the Lord : 
neither be ye sorry, for the joy of the Lord is your strength. So 
the Levites stilled the people, saying, Hold your peace ; for the 
dsij is holy ; neither be ye grieved. And all the people went 
their way to make great mirth, because they had understood 
the words." — Neh. viii. 10-12. 

THE deep significance of joy in the Christian 
life is hardly understood. It is too often 
regarded as something secondary ; whereas its 
presence is essential as the proof that God does 
indeed satisfy us, and that His service is our de- 
light. In our domestic life we do not feel satisfied 
if all the proprieties of deportment are observed, 
and each does his duty to the other; true love 



HOLINESS AND HAPPINESS. 215 

makes us happy in each other; as love gives out 
its warmth of affection, gladness is the sunshine 
that fills the home with its brightness. Even in 
suff*ering or poverty, the members of a loving 
family are a joy to each other. Without this glad- 
ness, especially, there is no true obedience on the 
part of the children. It is not the mere fulfil- 
ment of a command, or performance of a service, 
that a parent looks to ; it is the willing, joyful 
alacrity with which it is done that makes it 
pleasing. 

It is just so in the intercourse of God's children 
with their Father. Even in the eff'ort after a life 
of consecration and gospel obedience, we are con- 
tinually in danger of coming under the law again, 
with its. Thou shalt. The consequence always is 
failure. The law only worketh wrath ; it gives 
neither life nor strength. It is only as long as we 
are standing in the joy of our Lord, in the joy of 
our deliverance from sin, in the joy of His love, 
and what He is for us, in the joy of His presence, 
that we have the power to serve and obey. It is 
only when made free from every master, from sin 
and self and the law, and only when rejoicing in 
this liberty, that we have the power to render ser- 
vice that is satisfying either to God or to our- 
selves. " I will see you again," Jesus said, '' and 
your heart shall rejoice, and your joy shall no 



216 HOLY IN CHBIST. 

man take from you." Joy is the evidence and 
the condition of the abiding personal presence of 
Jesus. 

If holiness be the beauty and the glory of the 
life of faith, it is manifest that here especially the 
element of joy may not be wanting. We have 
already seen how the first mention of God as the 
Holy One was in the song of praise on the shore 
of the Red Sea ; how Hannah and Mary in their 
moments of inspiration praised God as the Holy 
One ; how the name of the Tiirice Holy in heaven 
comes to us in the song of the seraphs ; and how 
before the throne both the living creatures and 
the conquering multitude who sing the- song of 
the Lamb, adore God as the Holy One. We are 
to " worship Him in the beauty of holiness," " to 
sing praise at the remembrance of His Holiness ; " 
it is only in the spirit of worship and praise and 
joy that we fully can know God as holy. Much 
more, it is only under the inspiration of adoring 
love and joy that we can ourselves be made holy. 
It is as we cease from all fear and anxiety, from 
all strain and effort, and rest with singing in what 
Jesus is in His finished work as our sanctification, 
as we rest and rejoice in Him, that we shall be 
made partakers of His Holiness. It is the day of 
rest, is the day that God has blessed, the day of 
blessing and gladness ; and it is the day He 



HOLINESS AND HAPPINESS. 217 

blessed that is His holy day. Holiness and 
blessedness are inseparable. 

But is not this at variance with the teaching of 
Scripture and the experience of the saints ? Are 
not suffering and sorrow among God's chosen 
means of sanctification ? Are not the promises to 
the broken in heart, the poor in spirit, and the 
mourner? Are not self-denial and the forsaking 
of all we have, the crucifixion with Christ and 
the dying daily, the path to holiness ? and is not 
all this more matter of sorrow and pain than of 
joy and gladness? 

The answer will be found in the right appre- 
hension of the life of faith. Faith lifts above, 
and gives possession of, what is the very opposite 
of what we feel or experience. In the Christian 
life there is always a paradox : what appear irrec- 
oncilable opposites are found side by side at the 
same moment. Paul expresses it in the words, 
*'As dying, and, behold, we live; as sorrowful, 
yet always rejoicing ; as poor, yet making many 
rich ; as having nothing, yet possessing all 
things.'' And elsewhere thus, ''When I am weak, 
then Sim I strong." The apparent contradiction 
has its reconciliation, not only in the union of the 
two lives, the human and the Divine, in the per- 
son of each believer, but specially in our being, 
at one and the same moment, partakers of the 



218 HOLY IN CHRIST. 

death and the resurrection of Christ. Christ's 
death was one of pain and suffering, a real and 
terrible death, a rending asunder of the bonds 
that united soul and body, spirit and flesh. 
The power of that death works in us: we must 
let it work mightily if we are to live holy ; for in 
that death He sanctified Himself, that we our- 
selves might be sanctified in truth. Our holiness 
is, like His, in the death to our own will, and to 
all our own life. But — this we must seek to 
grasp — we do not approach death from the side 
from which Christ met it, as an enemy to be con- 
quered, as a suffering to be borne, before the new 
life can be entered on. No, the believer who 
knows what Christ is as the Risen One, ap- 
proaches death, the crucifixion of self and the 
flesh and the world, from the resurrection side, 
the place of victory, in the power of the Living 
Christ. When we were baptized into Christ, we 
were baptized into His death and resurrection as 
ours; and Christ Himself, the Risen Living Lord, 
leads us triumphantly into the experience of the 
power of His death. And so, to the believer who 
truly lives by faith, and seeks not in his own 
strugglings to crucify and mortif}^ the flesh, but 
knows the living Lord, the deep resurrection joy 
never for a moment forsakes Him, but is his 
strength for what may appear to others to be only 



HOLINESS AND HAPPINESS, 219 

painful sacrifice and cross-bearing. He says with 
Paul, "I glory in the cross through which I have 
been crucified." He never, as so many do, asks 
Paul's question, ^' Who shall deliver me from the 
body of this death ? " without sounding the joy- 
ful and triumphant answer as a present experi- 
ence, ''I thank God, through Jesus Christ our 
Lord." " Thanks be to God, which always lead- 
eth us in triumph in Christ." It is the joy of a 
Present Saviour, of the experience of a perfect 
salvation, the joy of a resurrection life, which 
alone gives the power to enter deeply and fully 
into the death that Christ died, and yield our will 
and our life to be wholly sanctified to God. In 
the joy of that life, from which the power of the 
death is never absent, it is possible to say with 
the Apostle each moment, '' As dying, and, be- 
hold, we live; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing." 
Let us seek to learn the two lessons : Holiness 
is essential to true happiness ; happiness essential 
to true holiness. Holiness is essential to true happi- 
ness. If you would have joy, the fulness of joy, 
an abiding joy which nothing can take away, be 
holy as God is holy. Holiness is blessedness. 
Nothing can darken or interrupt our joy but sin. 
Whatever be our trial or temptation, the joy of 
Jesus of* which Peter says, " in whom ye now re- 
joice with joy unspeakable," can more than com- 



220 HOLT IJSr CUBIST. 

pensate and outweigh. If we lose our joy, it 
must be sin. It may be an actual transgression, 
or an unconscious following of self or the world ; 
it may be the stain on conscience of something 
doubtful, or it may be unbelief that would live 
by sight, and thinks more of itself and its joy 
than of the Lord alone : whatever it be, nothing 
can take away our joy but sin. If we would live 
lives of joy, assuring God and man and ourselves 
that our Lord is everything, is more than all to 
us, oh, let us be holy ! Let us glory in Him who 
is our holiness : in His presence is fulness of joy. 
Let us live in the Kingdom which is joy in the 
Holy Ghost ; the Spirit of holiness is the Spirit of 
joy, because He is the Spirit of God. It is the 
saints, God's holy ones, who will shout for joy. 

And happiness is essential to true holiness. If 
you would be a holy Christian, you must be a 
happy Christian. Jesus was anointed by God 
with " the oil of gladness," that He might give us 
*' the oil of joy." In all our efforts after holiness, 
the wheels will move heavily if there be not the 
oil of joy ; this alone removes all strain and fric- 
tion, and makes the onward progress easy and 
delightful. Study to understand the Divine 
worth of joy. It is the evidence of your being 
in the Father's presence, and dwelling in His 
love. It is the proof of your being consciously 



HOLINESS AND HAPPINESS. 221 

free from the law and the strain of the spirit of 
bondage. It is the token of your freedom from 
care and responsibility, because you are rejoicing 
in Christ Jesus as your Sanctification, your 
Keeper, and your Strength. It is the secret of 
spiritual health and strength, filling all your 
service with the childlike happy assurance that 
the Father asks nothing that He does not give 
strength for, and that He accepts all that is done, 
however feebly, in this spirit. True happiness is 
always self-forgetful : it loses itself in the object 
of its joy. As the joy of the Holy Ghost fills us, 
and we rejoice in God the Holy One, through our 
Lord Jesus Christ, as we lose ourselves in the ado- 
ration and worship of the Thrice Holy, we become 
holy. This is, even here in the wilderness, '' the 
Highway of Holiness : the ransomed of the Lord 
shall come with singing ; the redeemed shall walk 
there ; everlasting joy shall be upon their heads ; 
they shall obtain joy and gladness." 

Do all God's children understand this ? that 
holiness is just another name, the true name, that 
God gives for happiness ; that it is indeed unut- 
terable blessedness to know that God does make 
us holy, that our holiness is in Christ, that 
Christ's Holy Spirit is within us. There is noth- 
ing so attractive as joy : have believers under- 
stood it that this is the joy of the Lord — to be 



222 HOLT IN C HEIST. 

holy? Or is not the idea of strain, and sacrifice, 
and sighing, of difficulty and distance so promi- 
nent, that the thought of being holy has hardly 
1 ever made the heart glad ? If it has been so, let 
it be so no longer. " Thou shalt glory in the 
Holy One of Israel: " let us claim this promise. 
Let the believing assurance that our Loving 
Father, and our Beloved Lord Jesus, and the 
Holy Spirit, who in dove-like gentleness rests 
within us, have engaged to do the work, and are 
doing it, fill us with gladness. Let us not seek 
our joy in what we see in ourselves of holiness: 
let us rejoice in the Holiness of God in Christ as 
ours ; let us rejoice in the Holy One of Israel. 
So shall our joy be unspeakable and unceasing; 
so shall we give Him the glory. 

Be ye holy, as I am holy. 



Most Blessed God ! I beseech Thee to reveal to 
me and to all Thy children the secret of rejoicing 
in Thee, the Holy One of Israel. 

Thou seest how much of the service of Thine 
own dear children is still in the spirit of bondage, 
and how many have never yet believed that the 
Highway of Holiness is one on which they may 



HOLINESS AND HAPPINESS, 223 

walk with singing, and shall obtain joy and glad- 
ness. O Father ! teach Thy children to rejoice in 
Thee. 

I ask Thee especially to teach us that, in deep 
poverty of spirit, in humility and contrition and 
utter emptiness, in the consciousness that there is 
no holiness in us, we can sing all the day of Thy 
Holiness as ours, of Thy glory which Thou lay est 
upon us, and which yet all the time is Thine 
alone. O Father ! open wide to Thy children the 
blessed mystery of the Kingdom, even the faith 
which sees all in Christ and nothing in itself; 
which indeed has and rejoices in all in Him ; 
which never has or rejoices in ought in itself. 

Blessed God, in Thy Word Thou hast said, 
^* The meek shall increase their joy in the Lord, 
and the poor among men shall rejoice in the Holy 
One of Israel." Oh, give us, by Thy Holy Spirit, 
in meekness and poverty of spirit, to live so in 
Christ, that His Holiness may be our ever-increas- 
ing joy, and that in Thyself, the Holy One of 
Israel, we may rejoice all the day. And may all 
see in us what blessedness it is to live as God's 
holy ones. Amen. 

1. The great hindrance to joy in God is expecting to find 
something in ourselves to rejoice over. At the commencement 
of this pursuit of holiness we always expect to see a great 
change wrought in ourselves. As we are led deeper into what 



224 HOLY IN CHRIST, 

faith and the faith-life is, we understand how, though we do not 
see the change as we expected, we may yet rejoice with joy 
unspeakable in what Jesus is. This is the secret of holiness. 

2. Joy must be cultivated. To rejoice is a command more 
frequently given than we know. It is part of the obedience of 
faith, to rejoice when we do not feel like doing so. Faith 
rejoices and sings, because God is holy. 

3. " Filled with joy and the Holy Ghost," '' The Kingdom is 
joy in the Holy Ghost.'* The Holy Spirit, the Blessed Spirit 
of Jesus is within thee, a very fountain of living water, of joy 
and gladness. Oh, seek to know Him, who dwells in thee, to 
work all that Jesus has for thee : He will be in thee the Spirit 
of faith and of joy. 

4. Love and joy ever keep company. Love, denying and 
forgetting itself for the brethren and the lost, living in them, 
finds the joy of God. " The kingdom of God is joy in the 
Holy Ghost.'* 



IN CHBI8T QUE SANCTIFICATION. 22^ 



TWENTY-SECOND DAY. 



HOLY IN CHRIST. 
5n Gbriet our Sancttttcation* 

" Of God are ye in Christ Jesus, wbo was made unto us wis- 
dom from God, both righteousness and sauctification and re- 
demption ; that, according as it is written, He that glorieth^ 
let him glory in the Lord." — 1 Cor. i. 30, 31. 

THESE words lead us on now to the very centre 
of God's revelation of the way of holiness. 
We know the steps of the road leading hither. 
He is holy, and holiness is His. He makes holy 
by coming near. His presence is holiness. In 
Christ's life, the holiness that had only been re- 
vealed in symbol, and as a promise of good things 
to come, had really taken possession of a human 
will, and been made one with true human nature. 
In His death every obstacle had been removed 
that could prevent the transmission of that holy 
nature to us : Christ had truly become our sanc- 
tification. In the Holy Spirit the actual commu- 
15 



226 HOLT IJSr CUBIST. 

nication of that holiness took place. And now 
we want to understand what the work is the Holy 
Spirit does, and how he communicates this holy 
nature to us : what our relation is to Christ as our 
sanctification, and what the position we have to 
take up toward Him, that in its fulness and its 
power it may do its work for us. 

The Divine answer to this question is, " Of God 
are ye in Christ'^ The one thing we need to ap- 
prehend is, what this our position and life in 
Christ is, and how that position and life may on 
our part be accepted and maintained. Of this we 
may be sure, that it is not something that it is 
high and beyond our reach. There need be no 
exhausting effort or hopeless sighing, " Who shall 
ascend into heaven, that is, to bring Christ down 
from above?" It is a life that is meant for the 
sinful and the weary, for the unworthy and the 
impotent. It is a life that is the gift of the Father's 
love, and that He Himself will reveal in each one 
who comes in childlike trust to Him. It is a life 
that is meant for our every-day life, that in every 
varying circumstance and situation will make and 
keep us holy. 

^'Of God are ye in ChrisL''^ Ere our Blessed 
Lord left the world. He spake : Lo ! I am with you 
alway, even to the end of the world. And it is 
written of Him : " He that descended is the same 



IN CHRIST OUR 8ANCTIFIGATI0N, 227 

that ascended far above all the heavens, that He 
might fill all things." " The Church is His body, 
the fulness of Him that fiUeth all in all." In the 
Holy Spirit the Lord Jesus is with His people 
here on earth. Though unseen, and not in the 
flesh, His Personal Presence is as real on earth as 
when He walked with His disciples. In regenera- 
tion the believer is taken out of his old place " in 
the flesh ;" he is no longer in the flesh, but in the 
spirit {Rom. viii. 9) ; he is really and actually in 
Christ. The living Christ is around him by His 
holy Presence. Wherever and whatever he be, 
however ignorant of his position or however un- 
faithful to it, there he is in Christ. By an act of 
divine and omnipotent grace, he has been planted 
into Christ, encircled on every side by the Power 
and the Love of Him who filleth all things, whose 
fulness specially dwells in His body here below, 
the Church. 

And how can one who is longing to know Christ 
fully as his sanctification, come to live out what 
God means and has provided in this — " in Christ"? 
The first thing that must be remembered is that it 
is a thing of faith and not of feeling. The promise 
of the indwelling and the quickening of the Holy 
One is to the humble and contrite. Just when 
I feel most deeply that I am not holy, and can do 
nothing to make myself holy, when I feel ashamed 



228 HOLY m CHRIST. 

of myself, just then is the time to turn from self 
and very quietly to say : I am in Christ. Here 
He is all around me. Like the air that surrounds 
me, like the light that shines on me, here is my 
Lord Jesus with me in His hidden but Divine and 
most real presence. My faith must in quiet rest 
and trust bow before the Father, of whom and by 
whose Mighty Grace I am in Christ: He will 
reveal it to me with ever-growing clearness and 
power. He does it as I believe, and in believing 
open my whole soul to receive what is implied in 
it: the sense of sinfulness and unholiness must 
become the strength of my trust and dependence. 
In such faith I abide in Christ. 

But because it is of faith, therefore it is of the 
Holy Spirit. Of God are ye in Christ. It is not 
as if God placed and planted us in Christ, and 
left it to us now to maintain the union. No, God 
is the Eternal One, the God of the everlasting life, 
wlio works every moment in a power that does 
not for one moment cease. What God gives. He 
continues with a never-ceasing giving. It is He 
who by the Holy Spirit makes this life in Christ 
a blessed reality in our consciousness. " We have 
received the Spirit of God that we might know the 
things that are freely given us of God." Faith is 
not only dependent on God for the gift it is to 
accept, but for the power to accept. Faith not 



m CHBIST OUR SAJSrCTIFICATION', 229 

only needs the Son as its filling and its food ; it 
needs the Spirit as its power to receive and hold. 
And so the blessed possession of all that it means 
to be in Christ our sanctification comes as we 
learn to bow before God in believing prayer for 
the mighty workings of the Spirit, and in the deep 
childlike trust that He will reveal and glorify in 
us this Christ our sanctification in whom we are. 

And how will the Spirit reveal this Christ in 
whom we are ? It will specially be as the Living 
One, the Personal Friend and Master. Christ is 
not only our Example and our Ideal. His life is 
not only an atmosphere and an inspiration, as we 
speak of a man who mightily influences us by his 
writings. Christ is not only a treasury and a ful- 
ness of grace and power, into which the Spirit is 
to lead us. But Christ is the Living Saviour, with 
a heart that beats with a love that is most tenderly 
human, and yet Divine. It is in this love He 
comes near, and into this love He receives us, 
when the Father plants us into Him. In the 
power of a personal love He wishes to exercise in- 
fluence, and to attach us to Himself. In that love 
of His we have the guarantee that His Holiness 
will enter us ; in that love the great power by 
which it enters. As the Spirit reveals to us where 
we are dwelling, in Christ and His love, and that 
this Christ is a living Lord and Saviour, there 



230 HOLY IN CHRIST. 

wakens within us the enthusiasm of a personal 
attachment, and the devotion of a loving allegiance, 
that make us wholly His. And it becomes 
possible for us to believe that we can be holy : we 
feel sure that in the path of holiness we can go ^^ 
from strength to strength. 

Such believing insight into our relation to 
Christ as being in Him, and such personal attach- 
ment to Him who has received us into His love 
and keeps us abiding there, becomes the spring of 
a new obedience. The will of God comes to us 
in the light of Christ's life and His love — each 
command first fulfilled by Him, and then passed 
on to us as the sure and most blessed help to more 
perfect fellowship with the Father and His Holi- 
ness. Christ becomes Lord and King in the soul, 
in the power of the Holy Spirit, guiding the will 
into all the perfect will of God, and proving Him- 
self to be its sanctification, as He crowns its 
obedience with ever larger inflow of the Presence 
and the Holiness of God. 

Is there any dear child of God at all disposed 
to lose heart as he thinks of what manner of man 
he ought to be in all holy living, let me call him 
to take courage. Could God have devised any- 
thing more wonderful or beautiful for such sinful, 
impotent creatures? Just think, Christ, God's 
own Son, made to be sanctification to you. The 



m CHRIST OUR SANCTIFIGATIOK 231 

Mighty, Loving, Holy Christ, sanctified through 
suffering that He might have sympathy with you, 
given to make you holy. What more could you 
desire? Yes, there is more : *' Of God you are in 
Him,^^ Whether you understand it or not, how- 
ever feebly you realize it, there it is, a thing most 
Divinely true and real. You are in Christ, by an 
act of God's own Mighty Power. And there, in 
Christ, God Himself longs to establish and con- 
firm you to the end. And you have, greatest 
wonder of all, the Holy Spirit within you to teach 
you to know, and believe, and receive, all that 
there is in Christ for you. And if you will but 
confess that there is in you no wisdom or power 
for holiness, none at all, and allow Christ, " the 
Wisdom of God and the Power of God," by the 
Holy Spirit within you, to lead you on, and prove 
how completely, how faithfully, how mightily, He 
can be your sanctification. He will do it most 
gloriously. 

O my brother ! come and consent more fully to 
God's way of holiness. Let Christ be your sanc- 
tification. Not a distant Christ to whom you 
look, but a Christ very near, all around you, in 
whom you are. Not a Christ after the flesh, a 
Christ of the past, but a present Christ in the 
power of the Holy Ghost. Not a Christ whom 
you can know by your wisdom, but the Christ of 



232 HOLT m CHRIST, 

God, who is a Spirit, and whom the Spirit within 
you, as you die to the flesh and self, will reveal 
in power. Not a Christ such as your little 
thoughts can frame a conception of, but a Christ 
according to the greatness of the heart and the 
love of God. Oh, come and accept this Christ, 
and rejoice in Him ! Be content now to leave all 
your feebleness, and foolishness, and faithlessness 
to Him, in the quiet confidence that He will do 
for you more than you can think. And so let it 
henceforth be, as it is written, He that glorieth, 
let him glory in the Lord. 

Be ye holy, as I am holy. 



Most Blessed Father ! I bow in speechless 
adoration before the holy mystery of Thy Divine 
Love. . . . 

Oh, forgive me, that I have known and believed 
it so little as it is worthy of being known and be- 
lieved. 

Accept my praise for what I have seen and 
tasted of its Divine blessedness. Accept, Lord 
God ! of the praise of a glad and loving heart that 
only knows that it never can praise Thee aright. 

And hear my prayer, my Father ! that in the 
power of Thy Holy Spirit, who dwells in me, I 



m GHBI8T OUR 8ANCTIFIGATI0N, 233 

may each day accept and live out fully what Thou 
hast given me in Christ my sanctifi cation. May 
the unsearchable riches there are in Him be the 
daily supply for my every need. May His Holi- 
ness, His delight in Thy will, indeed become 
mine. Teach me, above all, how this can most 
surely be, because I am, through the work of 
Thine Almighty Quickening Power, in Him, kept 
there by Thyself. My Father! my faith cries out : 
I can be holy, blessed be my Lord Jesus ! 

In this faith I yield myself to Thee, Lord Jesus, 
my King and Master, to do Thy will alone. In 
everything I do, great or small, I would act as 
one sanctified in Jesus, united to God's will in 
Him. It is Thou alone canst teach me to do this, 
canst give me strength to perform it. But I trust 
in Thee — art Thou not Christ my sanctification ? 
Blessed Lord ! I do trust Thee. Amen. 

1. Christ, as He lived and died on earth, is our sanctification. 
His life, the Spirit of His life, is what constitutes our holiness. 
To be in perfect harmony with Christ, to have His mind, is to 
be holy. 

2. Christ's Holiness had two sides. God sanctified Him by 
His Spirit: Christ sanctified Himself by following the leading 
of the Spirit, by giving up His will to God in everything. So 
God has made us holy in Christ ; and so we follow after and 
perfect holiness by yielding ourselves to God's Spirit, by giving 
up our will and living in the will of God, 



234 HOLY IN CHRIST, 

3. It is well that we take in every aspect of what God has re- 
vealed of holiness in His word. But let us never weary our- 
selves by seeking to grasp all completely. Let us even return 
to the simplicity that is in Jesus. To bow at His feet, to be- 
lieve that He knows all we need, and has it all, and loves to 
give it all, is rest. And holiness is resting in Jesus the rest of 
God. Let all our thoughts be gathered up into this one : 
Jesus, Blessed Jesus. 

4. This holy life in Christ is for to-day, when you read this. 
For to-day He is made of God unto you sanctification : to-day 
He will indeed be your holiness. Believe in Him for it; trust 
Him, praise Him. And remember : you are in Him, 



HOLINESS AND THE BODY, 235 



TWENTY-THIRD DAY. 



HOLY IN CHRIST. 
1bollne66 ariD tbe SoD^» 

"The temple of God is holy, which temple ye are. The body 
is for the Lord, and the Lord for the body. Know ye not that 
your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you ? 
therefore glorify God in your body," — 1 Cor. iii. 16, vi. 13, 19. 

" She that is unmarried is careful for the things of the Lord, 
that she may be holy both in body and spirit.'' — 1 Cor, vii. 34. 

" Present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to 
God." — JRom. xii. 1. 

COMING into the world, our Blessed Lord 
spake: "A body didst Thou prepare for me ; 
lo, I come to do Thy will, God." Leaving this 
world again, it was in His own body that He bore 
our sins upon the tree. So it was in the body, no 
less than in soul and spirit, that He did the will 
of God. And therefore it is said, " By which will 



236 HOLY IN CHRIST. 

we have been sanctified through the offering of the 
body of Jesus Christ once for all/' 

When praying for the Thessalonians and their 
sanctification, Paul says, "And the God of peace 
Himself sanctify you wholly ; and may your 
spirit and soul and body be preserved entire, 
without blame, at the coming of our Lord Jesus 
Christ." Of himself he had spoken as "always 
bearing about in the body the dying of Jesus, that 
the life also of Jesus may be manifested in our 
body. For we which live are always delivered 
unto death for Jesus' sake, that the life also of 
Jesus may be manifested in our mortal flesh^ His 
earnest expectation and hope was, " that Christ be 
magnified in my body, whether by life or by 
death." The relation between body and spirit is 
•so intimate, the power of sin in the spirit comes 
so much through the body, the body is so dis- 
tinctly the object both of Christ's redemption and 
the Holy Spirit's renewal, that our study of holi- 
ness will be seriously defective if we do not take 
in the teaching of Scripture on holiness in the 
body. 

It has been well said that the body is, to the 
soul and spirit dwelling and acting within it, like 
the walls of the city. Through them the enemy 
enters in. In time of war, everything yields to 
the defence of the walls. It is often because the 



HOLINESS AND THE BODY. 237 

believer does not know the importance of keeping 
the walls defended, keeping the body sanctified^ 
that he fails in having the soul and spirit pre- 
served blameless. Or it is because he does not 
understand that the guarding and sanctifying of 
the body in all its parts must be as distinctly a 
work of faith, and as directly through the mighty 
power of Jesus and the indwelling of the Spirit, 
as the renewing of the inner life, that progress in 
holiness is so feeble. The rule of the city we en- 
trust to Jesus: but the defence of the walls we 
keep in our own hands ; the King does not keep 
us as we expected, and we cannot discover the 
secret of failure. It is the God of peace Himself, 
who sanctifies wholly, who must preserve spirit 
and soul and body entire and without blame. The 
tabernacle with its wood, the temple with its 
stone, were as holy as all included within their 
walls: God's holy ones need the body to be holy. 
To realize the full meaning of this, let us 
remember how it was through the body sin 
entered. " The woman saw that the tree was 
good for food," this was the temptation in the 
flesh ; through this the soul was reached, "it was 
a delight to the eyes ; " through the soul it then 
passed into the spirit, " and to be desired to make 
one wise." In John's description of what is in 
the world (1 John ii. 15), we find the same three* 



238 HOLY IJSr CUBIST. 

fold division, " the lust of the flesh, the lust of 
the eyes, and the pride of life." And the three 
temptations of Jesus by Satan correspond exactly: 
he first sought to reach Him through the body, in 
the suggestion to satisfy His hunger by making 
bread ; the second (see Luke iv.) appealed to the 
soul, in the vision of the kingdoms of this world 
and their glory ; the third to the spirit, in the call 
to assert and prove His Divine Sonship by casting 
Himself down. Even to the Son of God the first 
temptation came, as to Adam and all in the 
world, as lust of the flesh, the desire to gratify 
the natural and lawful appetite of hunger. We 
cannot note too carefully that it was on a question 
of eating what appeared good for food that man's 
first sin was committed, and that that same ques- 
tion of eating to satisfy hunger was the battle- 
ground on which the Eedeemer's first encounter 
with Satan took place. It is on the question of 
eating and drinking what is good and lawful that 
more Christians than are aware of it are foiled by 
Satan. To have every appetite of the body under 
the rule and regulation of the Holy Spirit appears 
to some needless, to others too difiicult. And yet 
it must be, if the body is to be holy, as God's 
temple, and we are to glorify Him in our body 
and our spirit. The first approaches of sin are 



HOLINESS AND THE BODY. 239 

made through the body : in the body the com- 
plete victory will be gained. 

What Scripture teaches as to the intimacy of 
the connection between the body and spirit, 
physiology confirms. What appear at first 
merely physical transgressions leave a stain and 
have a degrading influence on the soul, and 
through it drag down the spirit. And on the 
other side, spiritual sins, sins of thought and 
imagination and disposition, pass through the soul 
into the body, fix themselves in the nervous con- 
stitution, and express themselves even in the coun- 
tenance and the habits or tendencies of the body. 
Sin must be combated not only in the region of 
the spirit: if we are to perfect holiness, we must 
cleanse ourselves from all defilement of flesh and 
spirit. " If through the Spirit ye do make dead 
the deeds of the body, ye shall live." If we are 
indeed to be cleansed from sin and made holy 
unto God, the body, as the outworks, must very 
specially be secured from the power of Satan and 
of sin. 

And how is this to be done ? God has made 
very special provision for this. Holy Scripture 
speaks so explicitly of the Holy Spirit, the Spirit 
that communicates holiness, in connection with 
the body. At first sight it looks as if the words, 
your bodies, were simply used as equivalent to, 



240 HOLY IN CHRIST, 

your persons, yourselves. But as the deeper in- 
sight into the power of sin in the body, and the 
need of a deliverance specially there, quickens 
our perception, we see what is meant by the body 
being the temple of the Holy Spirit. We notice 
how very specially it is of sins in the body that 
Paul speaks as defiling God's holy temple ; and 
how it is through the power of the Holy Ghost in 
the body that he would have us glorify God. 
" Know ye not that your body is the temple of the 
Holy Ghost : glorify God therefore, in the power 
of the Holy Spirit, in your body.'^^ The Holy 
Spirit must not only exercise a restraining and 
regulating influence on the appetites of the body 
and their gratification, so that they be in modera- 
tion and temperance, — this is only the negative 
side, — but there must be a positively spiritual 
element, making the exercise of natural functions 
a service of holy joy and liberty to the glory of 
God ; no longer a threatened hindrance to the life 
of obedience and fellowship, but a means of grace, 
a real help to the spiritual life. It is only in a 
body that is full of the holy life, very entirely 
possessed of God's Spirit, that this will be the 
case. 

And how can this be obtained? In the true 
Christian life, self-denial is the path to enjoyment, 
renunciation to possession, death to life. As long 



HOLINESS AND THE BODY. 241 

as there is ought that we think we have liberty 
and power to use or enjoy aright, if we but do so 
in moderation, we have not yet seen or confessed 
our own unholiness, or the need of the entire 
renewing of the Holy Spirit. It is not enough to 
say, " Every creature of God is good, if it be 
received with thanksgiving;" we must remember 
the addition, " for it is sanctified by the word and 
by prayer." This sanctifying of every creature 
and its use is a thing as real and solemn as the 
sanctifying of ourselves. And this will only be 
where, if need be, we sacrifice the gift and the 
liberty to use it, until God gives us the power 
truly to use it to His glory alone. Of one of the 
most sacred of Divine institutions, marriage, Paul, 
who so denounces those who would forbid to 
marry, says distinctly that there may be cases in 
which a voluntary celibacy may be the surest and 
acceptable way of being " holy both in body and 
spirit." When to be holy as God is holy indeed 
becomes the great desire and aim of life, every- 
thing will be cherished or given up as it promotes 
the chief end. The actual and active presence of 
the Holy Spirit in the life of the body will be the 
fire that is kept burning continually on the altar. 
And how is this to be attained? Of the body 
as of the spirit it is God, God in Christ, who is 
our Keeper and our Sanctifier. The guarding of 
16 



242 HOLY m CHRIST. 

the walls of the city must be entrusted to Him 
who rules within. " I am persuaded that He is 
able to guard my deposit," to keep that which I 
have committed to Him, must become as definitely 
true of the body, and of each of its functions of 
which we are conscious that it is the occasion of 
doubt or of stumbling, as it has been of the soul 
we entrusted to Him for salvation. A fixed 
deposit in a bank is money given away out of my 
hands to be kept there : the body or any part of 
it that needs to be made holy must be a deposit 
with Jesus. Faith must trust His acceptance and 
guarding of it; prayer and praise must daily 
afresh renew the assurance, must confirm the 
committal of the deposit, and maintain the 
fellowship with Jesus. Abiding thus in Him and 
His Holiness, we shall receive, in a life of trust 
and joy, the power to prove, even in the body, 
how fully and wholly we are in Him who is made 
unto us sanctification, how real and true the 
Holiness of God is in His people. 

Be ye holy, as I am holy. 



Blessed Lord ! who art my sanctification, I 
come to Thee now with a very special request. O 
Thou who didst in Thine own body bear our sins 



HOLmESS AND THE BODY. 243 

on the tree, and of whom it is written, " We have 
been sanctified through the offering of the body of 
Jesus Christ once for all," be pleased to reveal to 
me how my body may to the full experience the 
power of Thy wonderful redemption. I do desire 
in soul and body to be holy to the Lord. 

Lord ! I have too little understood that my 
body is the temple of the Holy Ghost, that there 
is nothing in it that can be matter of indifference, 
that its every state and function is to be holiness 
to the Lord. And where I saw that this should 
be so, I have still sought myself to guard from 
the enemy's approaches these the walls of the 
city. I forget how this part of my being too 
could alone be kept and sanctified by faith, by 
Thy taking and keeping charge of what faith en- 
trusted to Thee. 

Lord Jesus ! I come now to surrender this body 
with all its needs into Thy hands. In weariness 
and nervousness, in excitement and enjoyment, in 
hunger and want, in health and plenty, O my 
holy Saviour, let my body be in Thy keeping 
every moment. Thou callest us, " being made 
free from sin, to present our members as servants 
of righteousness unto sanctification." Saviour ! 
in the faith of the freedom from sin which I have 
in Thee, I present every member of my body to 
Thee : I believe the Spirit of life in Thee makes 



244 HOLT IN CHRIST. 

me free from the law of sin in my members. 
Whether living or dying, be Thou magnified in 
my body. Amen. 

1, In the tabernacle and temple, the material part was to be 
in harmony with, and the embodiment of, the holiness that 
dwelt within. It was therefore all made according to the pat- 
tern shown in the mount. In the two last chapters of Exodus, 
we have eighteen times *' as the Lord commanded." Every- 
thing, even in the exterior, was the embodiment of the will of 
God. Even so our body, as God's temple, must in everything 
be regulated by God's word, quickened and sanctified by the 
Holy Spirit. 

2. As part of this holiness in the body. Scripture mentions 
dress. Speaking of the "outward adorning of plaiting the 
hair, of wearing jewels, or the putting on of apparel,"' as incon- 
sistent with ** the apparel of a meek and quiet spirit," Peter 
says, " After this manner aforetime the holy womeuy who hoped 
in God, adorned themselves." Holiness was seen in their 
dressing ; their body was the temple of the Holy Spirit. 

.3. " If ye through the Spirit do make dead the deeds of the 
body, ye shall live." His quickening energy must reign 
through the whole. We are so accustomed to connect the 
spiritual with the ideal and invisible, that it will need time 
and thought and faith to realize how the physical atid the sen- 
sible influence our spiritual life, and must be under the mastery 
and inspiration of God's Spirit. Even Paul says, " I buffet my 
body, and bring it into bondage, lest I myself should be 
rejected." 

4. If God actually breathed His Spirit into the body of Adam 
formed out of the ground, let it not be thought strange that the 
Holy Spirit should now animate our bodies too with His sancti- 
fying energy. 



HOLINESS AND THE BODY, 245 

5. '* Corporeality is the end of the ways of God." This deep 
saying of an old divine reminds us of a much neglected truth. 
The great work of God's Spirit is to ally Himself with matter, 
and form it into a spiritual body for a dwelling for God. In 
our body the Holy Spirit will do it, if He gets complete posses- 
sion. 

6. It is on this truth of the Holy Spirit's power in the body 
that what is called Faith -healing rests. Through all ages, in 
times of special spiritual quickening, God has given it to some 
to see how Christ would make, even here, the body partaker of 
the life and power of the Spirit. To those who do see it, the 
link between Holiness and Healing is a very close and blessed 
one, as the Lord Jesus takes possession of the body for 
Himself. 



246 HOLY IN CHRIST. 



TWENTY-FOURTH DAY. 



HOLY IN CHRIST. 
1bollne66 ant) Gleaneltifl^ 

" Having therefore these promises, beloved, let us cleanse our- 
selves from all defilement of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness 
in the fear of God.'^ — 2 Cor, vii. 1. 

THAT holiness is more than cleansing, and 
must be preceded by it, is taught us in more 
than one passage of the New Testament. ^' Christ 
loved the Church, and gave Himself up for it, 
that He might sanctify it, having cleansed it by the 
washing of water with the word." '' If a man 
cleanse himself from these, he shall be a vessel 
sanctified.'^'' The cleansing is the negative side, the 
being separate and not touching the unclean 
thing, the removal of impurity ; the sanctifying 
is the positive union and fellowship with God, 
and the participation of the graces of the Divine 
life and holiness. 2 Cor, vi. 17, 18. So we read 
too of the altar, that God spake to Moses : " Thou 



HOLINESS AND CLEANSING. 247 

shalt cleanse the altar, when thou makest atone- 
ment for it, and thou shalt anoint it, to sanctify 
it." Ex, xxix. 36. Cleansing must ever prepare 
the way, and ought always to lead on to holiness. 

Paul speaks of a twofold defilement, of flesh 
and spirit, from which we must cleanse ourselves. 
The connection between the two is so close, that 
in every sin both are partakers. The lowest and 
most carnal form of sin will enter the spirit, and, 
dragging it down into partnership in crime, will 
defile and degrade it. And so will all defilement 
of spirit in course of time show its power in the 
flesh. Still we may speak of the two classes of. 
sins as they owe their origin more directly to the 
flesh or the spirit. 

" Let us cleanse ourselves from all defilement of 
flesh,^^ The functions of our body may be classed 
under the three heads of the nourishment, the 
propagation, and the protection of our life. 
Through the first the world daily solicits our 
appetite with its food and drink. As the fruit 
good for food was the temptation that overcame 
Eve, so the pleasures of eating and drinking are 
among the earliest forms of defilement of the 
flesh. Closely connected with this is what we 
named second, and which is in Scripture specially 
connected with the word flesh. We know how in 
Paradise the sinful eating was at once followed by 



248 HOLY IN CHRIST. 

the awakening of sinful lust and of shame. In 
his First Epistle to the Corinthians, Paul closely 
connects the two (1 Cor. vi. 13, 15), as he also 
links drunkenness and impurity. 1 Cor, vi. 9, 10. 
Then comes the third form in which the vitality 
of the body displays itself: the instinct of self- 
preservation, setting itself against everything that 
interferes with our pleasures and comfort. What 
is called temper, with its fruits of anger and 
strife, has its roots in the physical constitution, 
and is one among the sins of the flesh. From all 
this, the Christian, w^ho would be holy, must most 
determinedly cleanse himself. He must yield 
himself to the searching of God's Spirit, to be 
taught what there is in the flesh that is not in 
harmony with the temperance and self-control 
demanded both by the law of nature and the law 
of the Spirit. He must believe, what Paul felt 
that the Corinthians so emphatically needed to be 
taught, that the Holy Spirit dwells in the body, 
making its members the members of Christ, and 
in this faith put off the works of the flesh; he 
must cleanse himself from all defilement of 
flesh. 

''And of spirit^ As the source of all defilement 
of the flesh is self-gratification, so self-seeking is 
at the root of all defilement of the spirit. In 
relation to God, it manifests itself in idolatry, be 



H0LTNE88 AND CLEANSING. 249 

it in the worship of other gods, after our own 
heart, the love of the world more than God, or 
the doing our will rather than His. In relation 
to our fellow-men it shows itself in envy, hatred, 
and want of love, cold neglect or harsh judging of 
others. In relation to ourselves it is seen as 
pride, ambition, or envy, the disposition that 
makes self the centre round which all must move, 
and by which all must be judged. 

For the discovery of such defilement of spirit, 
no less than of the sins of the flesh, the believer 
needs the light of the Holy Spirit; that the un- 
cleanness may indeed be cleansed out and cast 
away for ever. Even unconscious sin, if we are 
not earnestly willing to have it shown to us, will 
most effectually prevent our progress in the path 
of holiness. 

" Beloved ! let us cleanse ourselves.^^ The cleansing 
is sometimes spoken of as the work of God (Acts 
XV. 9; 1 John i. 9); sometimes as that of Christ 
{John xy. 3; Eph. v. 26; Tit. ii. 14). Here we 
are commanded to cleanse ourselves. God does 
His work in us by the Holy Spirit ; the Holy 
Spirit does His work by stirring us up and 
enabling us to do. The Spirit is the strength of 
the new life; in that strength we must set our- 
selves determinedly to cast out whatever is un- 
clean. '' Come out, and be ye separate, and touch 



250 HOLY m CHRIST. 

not the unclean thing." It is not only the doing 
what is sinful, it is not only the willing of it, that 
the Christian must avoid, but even the touching 
it: the involuntary contact with it must be so un- 
bearable as to force the cry, wretched man that 
that I am ! and to lead on to the deliverance, 
which the Spirit of the life of Christ does bring. 

And how is this cleansing to be done? When 
Hezekiah called the priests to sanctify the temple 
that had been defiled, we read (2 Chron. xxix.), 
*' The priests went in unto the inner part of the 
house of the Lord to cleanse it, and brought out 
all the uncleanness that they found." Only then 
could the sin-oflFering of atonement and the burnt- 
offering of consecration, with the thank-oflferings, 
be brought, and God's service be restored. Even 
thus must all that is unclean be looked out, and 
brought out, and utterly cast out. However 
deeply rooted the sin may appear, rooted in con- 
stitution and habit, we must cleanse ourselves of 
it if we would be holy. " If we walk in the light, 
as He is in the light, the blood of Jesus Christ 
cleanseth from all sin." As we bring out every 
sin from the inner part of the house into the light 
of God and walk in the light, the precious blood 
that justifies will work mightily to cleanse too: 
the blood brings into living contact with the life 
and the love of God. Let us come into the light 



HOLINESS AND CLEANSING. 251 

with the sin: the blood will prove its mighty 
power. Let us cleanse ourselves in yielding our- 
selves to the light to reveal and condemn, to the 
blood to cleanse and sanctify. 

" Let us cleanse ourselves, perfecting holiness in 
the fear of the Lord^ We read in Hebrews (x. 14)^ 
*^ Christ hath perfected for ever them that are 
sanctified." As we have so often seen that what 
God has made holy man must make holy too, as 
he accepts and appropriates the holiness God has 
bestowed, so here with the perfection which the 
saints have in Christ. We must perfect holiness: 
holiness must be carried out into the whole of 
life, and carried on even to its end. As God's 
holy ones, we must go on to perfection, perfecting 
holiness. Do not let us be afraid of the word. 
Our Blessed Lord used it when He gave us the 
command, '^ Be ye perfect, even as your Father 
in heaven is perfect." A child striving after the 
perfection in knowledge of his profession, which 
he hopes to attain when he has finished school, is 
told by his teacher that the way to the perfection 
he hopes for at the end of his course is to seek to 
be perfect in the lessons of each day. To be per- 
fect in the small portion of the work that each 
hour brings, is the path to perfection that will 
crown the whole. The Master calls us to a per* 
fection like that of the Father : He hath already 



252 HOLY m CHRIST, 

perfected us in Himself: He holds out the pros- 
pect of perfection ever growing. His word calls 
us here day by day to be perfecting holiness. Let 
^ us seek in each duty to be whole-hearted and en- 
tire. Let us, as teachable scholars, in every act 
of worship or obedience, in every temptation and 
trial, do the very best which God's Spirit can 
enable us to do. '' Let patience have its perfect 
work, that ye may be perfect and entire, lacking 
in nothing." ** The God of peace make you per- 
fect in every good work to do His will." 

'''Having therefore these promises^ beloved, let us 
cleanse ourselves from all defilement of flesh and 
spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God.'' It 
is faith that gives the courage and the power to 
cleanse from all defilement, perfecting holiness in 
the fear of God. It is as the promises of the 
Divine love and indwelling (2 Cor. vi. 16-18) are 
made ours by the Holy spirit, that we shall share 
the victory which overcometh the w^orld, even our 
faith. In the path along which we have already 
€ome, from the rest in Paradise down through 
Holy Scripture, we have seen the wondrous reve- 
lation of these promises in ever-growing splendor. 
That God the Holy One will make us holy ; that 
God the Holy One will dwell with the lowly; 
that God in His Holy One has come to be our 
holiness ; that God has planted us in Christ that 



HOLINESS AND CLEANSING. 253 

He may be our sanctification ; that God, who 
chose us in sanctification of the Spirit, has 
given us the Holy Spirit in our hearts, and now 
watches over us in His love to work out through 
Him His purposes and to perfect our holiness : 
such are the promises that have been set before 
us. " Having therefore these promises, beloved, 
let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of flesh 
and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God.'^ 
Beloved brother ! see here again God's way of 
holiness. Arise and step on to it in the faith of 
the promise, fully persuaded that what He hath 
promised He is mighty to perform. Bring out of 
the inner part of the house all uncleanness ; bring 
it into the light of God; confess it and cast it at 
His feet, who takes it away, and cleanses you in 
His blood. Yield yourself in faith to perfect, in 
Christ your Strength, the Holiness to which you 
are called. As your Father in heaven is perfect, 
give yourself to Him as a little child to be perfect 
too in your daily lessons and your daily walk. 
Believe that your surrender is accepted : that the 
charge committed to Him is undertaken. And 
give glory to Him who is able to do above what 
you can ask or think. 

Be ye holy, as I am holy. 



254 HOLY IN CHRIST. 

Holy Lord Jesus ! Thou didst give Thyself for 
us, that, having cleansed us for Thyself as Thine 
own, Thou mightest sanctify us and present us to 
Thyself a glorious Church, not having spot or 
wrinkle or any such thing. Blessed be Thy 
Name for the wonderful love. Blessed be Thy 
Name for the wonderful cleansing. Through the 
washing by the word and the washing in the blood, 
Thou hast made us clean every whit. And as we 
walk in the light, Thou cleansest every moment. 

With these promises, in the power of Thy word 
and blood, Thou callest us to cleanse ourselves 
from all defilement of flesh and spirit. Blessed 
Lord ! graciously reveal in Thy Holy Light all 
that is defilement, even its most secret working. 
Let me live as one who is to be presented to Thee 
without spot or wrinkle or any such thing — 
cleansed with a Divine cleansing, because Thou 
gavest Thyself to do it. Under the living power of 
Thy word and blood, applied by the Holy Spirit, let 
my way be clean, and my hands clean, my lips 
clean, and my heart clean. Cleanse me thoroughly, 
that I may walk with Thee in white here on earth, 
keeping my garments unspotted and undefiled. 
For Thy great love's sake, my Blessed Lord. Amen. 



1. Cleansing has almost always one aim : a cleansed vessel 
is fit for use. Spiritual work done for God, with the honest de- 



HOLINESS AND CLEANSING. 255 

sire that He may through His Spirit use us, will give urgency 
to our desire for cleansing. A vessel not cleansed cannot be 
used : is not this the reason that there are some workers God 
cannot bless? 

2. All defilement: one stain defiles. **Let us cleanse our- 
selves from all defilement.*' 

3. No cleansing without Light. Open the heart for the 
Light to shine in. 

4. No cleansing like fire. Give the defilement over to the 
fire of His Holiness, the fire that consumes and purifies. Give 
it into the death of Jesus, to Jesus Himself. 

5. ** Perfecting holiness in the fear of God:*' it is a solemn 
work. Rejoice with trembling — work out your salvation with 
fear and trembling. 

6. " Having these promises," it is a blessed work to cleanse 
ourselves — entering into the promises, the purity, the love of 
our Lord. The fear of God need never hinder the faith in 
Him. And true faith will never hinder the practical work of 
cleansing. 

7. If we walk in the light, the blood cleanseth. The light re- 
veals ; we confess and forsake, and accept the blood ; so we 
cleanse ourselves. Let there be a very determined purpose to 
be clean from all defilement, everything that our Father con- 
siders a stain. 



256 HOLT IN CHRIST 



TWENTY-FIFTH DAY. 



HOLY IN CHRIST. 
Ibolis anD J8lamele60» 

"Ye are witnesses, and God also, how holily and justly and 
unhlameahly we behaved ourselves among you that believe. — 
The Lord make you to increase and abound in love one toward 
another, and toward all men, to the end He may stablish your 
hearts unblameable in holiness before our God and Father at 
the coming of our Lord Jesus with all His holy ones." — 1 Thess, 
ii. 10, iii. 12, 13. 

"He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, 
that we should be holy and without blemish before Him in 
loveJ' — Eph. i. 4. 

THERE are two Greek words, signifying nearly 
the same, used frequently along with the 
word holy, and following it, to express what the 
result and effect of holiness will be as manifested 
in the visible life. The one is translated without 
blemish, spotless, and is that also used of our 
Lord and His sacrifice, the Lamb without blemish 
{Heb, ix. 14; 1 Pet. i. 19). It is then used of 



HOLY AND BLAMELESS. 257 

God's children with holy — holy and without 
blemish {Eyh. i. 4, 5, 27; Col i. 22; Phil ii. 15; 
Jiide 24; 2 Pe^. iii. 14). The other is without 
blame, faultless (as in Luke i. 6 ; Phil ii. 15, iii. 
6), and is also found in conjunction with holy (1 
Thess. ii. 10, iii. 13, v. 23). In answer to the 
question as to whether this blamelessness has 
reference to God's estimate of the saints or men's, 
Scripture clearly connects it with both. In some 
passages {Eph. i. 4, v. 27 ; Col i. 22 ; 1 Thess. iii. 
15; 2 Pet iii. 14) the words "before Him," " to 
Himself," " before our God and Father," indicate 
that the first thought is of the spotlessness and 
faultlessness in the presence of a Holy God, which 
is held out to us as His purpose and our y)rivilege. 
In others (such as Phil ii. 15 ; 1 TJiess. ii. 10)^ 
the blamelessness in the sight of men stands in 
the foreground. In each case the word may be 
considered to include both aspects : without 
blemish and without blame must stand the double 
test of the judgment of God and man too. 

And what is now the special lesson which this 
linking together of these two words in Scripture, 
and the exposition of holy by the addition of 
blameless, is meant to teach us? A lesson of 
deep importance. In the pursuit of holiness, the 
believer, the more clearly he realizes what a deep 
spiritual blessing it is, to be found only in separa- 
17 



258 HOLT m CHRIST. 

tion from the world, and direct fellowship with 
God, to be possessed fully only through a real 
Divine indwelling, may be in danger of looking 
too exclusively to the Divine side of the blessing, 
in its heavenly and supernatural aspect. He may 
forget how repentance and obedience, as the path 
leading up to holiness, must cover every, even the 
minutest detail of daily life. He may not under- 
stand how faithfulness to the leadings of the 
Spirit, in such measure as we have Him already, 
faithfulness to His faintest whisper in reference to 
ordinary conduct, is essential to all fuller ex- 
perience of His power and work as the Spirit of 
holiness. He may, above all, not have learnt 
how, not only obedience to what he knows to be 
God's will, but a very tender and willing teach- 
ableness to receive all that the Spirit has to show 
him of his imperfections and the Father's perfect 
will concerning him, is the only condition on 
which the Holiness of God can be more fully re- 
vealed to us and in us. And so, while most in- 
tent on trying to discover the secret of true and 
full holiness from the Divine side, he may be 
tolerating faults which all around him can notice, 
or remaining, — and that not without sin, because 
it comes from the want of perfect teachableness, — 
ignorant of graces and beauties of holiness with 
which the Father would have had him adorn the 



HOLY AND BLAMELESS, 259 

doctrine of holiness before men. He may seek to 
live a very holy, and yet think little of a per- 
fectly blameless life. 

There have been such saints, holy but hard, 
holy but distant, holy but sharp in their judg- 
ments of others ; holy, but men around said, 
unloving and selfish ; the half-heathen Samaritan 
more kind and self-sacrificing than the holy 
Levite and priest. If this be true, it is not the 
teaching of Holy Scripture that is to blame. In 
linking holy and without blemish (or without 
blame) so closely, the Holy Spirit would have led 
us to seek for the embodiment of holiness as a 
spiritual power in the blamelessness of practice 
and of daily life. Let every believer who rejoices 
in God's declaration that he is holy in Christ seek 
also to perfect holiness, reach out after nothing 
less than to be " unblameable in holiness." 

That this blamelessness has very special refer- 
ence to our intercourse with our fellow-men we 
see from the way in which it is linked with love. 
So in Eph, i. 4, "That we should be holy and 
without blemish before Him in love.'^ But spe- 
cially in that remarkable passage : '' The Lord 
make you to increase and abound in love toward 
one another, and toward all men, to the end He 
may establish your hearts unblameable in holiness^ 
The holiness and the blamelessness, the positive 



260 HOLY m CHRIST, 

hidden Divine life-principle, and the external and 
human life-practice — both are to find their 
strength, by which we are to be established in 
them, in our abounding and everflowing love. 

Holiness and lovingness — it is of deep impor- 
tance that these words should be inseparably 
linked in our minds, as their reality in our lives. 
We have seen, in the study of the holiness of 
God, how love is the element in which it dwells 
and works, drawing to itself and making like itself 
all that it can get possession of. Of the fire of 
Divine holiness love is the beautiful flame, reach- 
ing out to communicate itself and assimilate to it- 
self all it can lay hold of. In God's children true 
holiness is the same; the Divine fire burns to 
bring into its own blessedness all that comes 
within its reach. When Jesus sanctified Himself 
that we might be sanctified in truth, that was 
nothing but love giving itself to the death that 
the sinful might share His holiness. Selfishness 
and holiness are irreconcilable. Ignorance may 
think of sanctity as a beautiful garment with 
which to adorn itself before God, while under- 
neath there is a selfish pride saying, " I am holier 
than thou," and quite content that the other 
should want what it boasts of. True holiness, on 
the contrary, is the expulsion and the death of 
selfishness, taking possession of heart and life to 



HOLY AND BLAMELESS. 261 

be the ministers of that fire of love that consumes ' 
itself, to reach and purify and save others. 
Holiness is love. Abounding love is what Paul 
prays for as the condition of unblameable holi- 
ness. It is as the Lord makes us to increase and 
abound in love, that He can establish our hearts 
unblameable in holiness. 

The Apostle speaks of a twofold love, " love 
toward each other, and toward all men." Love to 
the brethren was what our Lord Himself enjoined 
as the chief mark of discipleship. And He 
prayed the Father for it as the chief proof to the 
world of the truth of His Divine mission. It is 
in the holiness of love, in a loving holiness, that 
the unity of the body will be proved and pro- 
moted, and prepared for the fuller workings of 
the Holy Spirit. In the Epistles to the Corinth- 
ians and Galatians, division and distance among 
believers are named as the sure proof of the life 
of self and the flesh. Oh, let us, if we would be 
holy, begin by being very gentle, and patient, and 
forgiving, and kind, and generous in our inter- 
course with all the Father's children. Let us 
study the Divine image of the love that seeketh 
not its own, and pray unceasingly that the Lord 
may make us to abound in love to each other. 
The holiest will be the humblest and most self- 
forgetting, the gentlest and most self-denying, the 



262 HOLY IN CHRIST, 

kindest and most thoughtful of others for Jesus' 
sake. " Put on therefore, as God's elect, holy and 
beloved^ a heart of compassion, kindness, humility, 
meekness, long-suffering." Cot iii. 12, 13. 

And then the love toward all men. A love 
proved in conduct and intercourse of dail}^ life. 
A love that not only avoids anger and evil temper 
and harsh judgments, but exhibits the more posi- 
tive virtue of active devotion to the welfare and 
interests of all. A charitable love that cares for 
the bodies as well as the souls. A love that not 
only is ready to help when it is called, but that 
really gives itself up to self-denial and self-sacri- 
fice to seek out and relieve the needs of the most 
wretched and unworthy. A love that does indeed 
take Christ's love, that brought Him from heaven 
and led Him to choose the cross, as the only law 
and measure for its conduct, and makes every- 
thing subordinate to the Godlike blessedness of 
giving, of doing good, of embracing and saving 
the needy and lost. Thus abounding in love, we 
shall be unblameable in holiness. 

It is in Christ we are holy ; of God we are in 
Christ, who is made of God unto us sanctifica- 
tion : it is in this faith that Paul prays that the 
Lord, our Lord Jesus, may make us increase and 
abound in love. The Father is the fountain. He 
is the channel; the Holy Spirit is the living 



HOLY AND BLAMELESS. 263: 

stream. And He is our Life, through the Spirit. 
It is by faith in Him, by abiding in Him and in 
His love, by allowing, in close union with Him, 
the Spirit to shed abroad the love of God, that we 
shall receive the answer to our prayer, and shall 
by Himself be established unblameable in holi- 
ness. Let it be with us a prayer of faith that 
changes into praise: Blessed be the Lord, who 
will make us increase and abound in love, and 
will establish us unblameable in holiness before 
our God and Father, at the coming of our Lord 
Jesus with His holy ones. 

Be ye holy, as I am holy. 



Most Gracious God and Father! again do I 
thank Thee for that wondrous salvation, through 
sanctification of the Spirit, which has made us 
holy in Christ. And I thank Thee that the 
Spirit can so make us partakers of the life of 
Christ, that we too may be unblameable in holi- 
ness. And that it is the Lord Himself who makes 
us to increase and abound in love, to the end our 
hearts may be so established ; that the abounding 
love and the unblameable holiness are both from 
Him. 

Blessed Lord and Saviour! I come now to 



264 HOLY m CHRIST. 

claim and take as my own, what Thou art able to 
do for me. I am holy only in Thee ; in Thee I 
am holy. In Thee there is for me the power to 
abound in love. Thou, in whom the fulness of 
God's love abides, and in whom I abide, the Lord, 
my Lord, make me to abound in love. In union 
with Thee, in the life of faith in which Thou 
livest in me, it can be and it shall be. By the 
teaching of Thy Holy Spirit lead me in all the 
footsteps of Thy self-denying love, that I too may 
be consumed in blessing others. 

And thus, Lord ! mightily establish my heart 
to be unblameable in holiness. Let self perish at 
Thy presence. Let Thy Holiness, giving itself to 
make the sinner holy, take entire possession, until 
my heart and life are sanctified wholly, and my 
whole spirit and soul and body be preserved 
blameless unto Thy coming. Amen. 

1. Let us pray very earnestly that our interest in the study 
of holiness may not be a thing of the intellect or the emotions, 
but of the will and the life, seen of all men in the daily walk 
and conversation. "Abounding in love/' '' unblameable in 
holiness/* will give favor with God and man. 

2. " God is Love ; " Creation is the outflow of love. Redemp- 
tion is the sacrifice and the triumph of love. Holiness is the 
lire of love. The beauty of the life of Jesus is love. All we 
■enjoy of the Divine we owe to love. Our holiness is not God's, 
is not Christ's, if we do not love. 

3. " Love seeketh not its own.'* ** Love never faileth.'* 



HOLT AND BLAMELESS. 265 

"Love is the fulfilling of the law." ** The greatest of these is 
love." " The end of the commandment is love." To love God 
and man is to be holy. In the intercourse of daily life, holi- 
ness can have its simple and sweet beginnings and its exercise ; 
so, in its highest attainment, holiness is love made perfect. 

4. Faith has all its worth from love, from the love of God, 
whence it draws and drinks, and the love to God and man 
which streams out of it. Let us be strong in faith, then shall 
we abound in love. 

5. " The love of God hath been shed abroad in our hearts by 
the Holy Ghost which was given unto us." Let this be our 
confidence. 



266 HOLY IN CHRIST 



TWENTY-SIXTH DAY. 



HOLY IN CHRIST. 
1bollne06 anD tbe mill ot 0o&* 

" This is the will of God, even your sanctification." — 1 Thess. 
iv. 3. 

*' Lo, I am come to do Thy will. By which will we have 
been sanctified, through the offering of the body of Jesus 
Christ once for oWr—Heh. x. 9, 10. 

IN the will of God we have the union of His 
Wisdom and Power. The Wisdom decides 
and declares what is to be: the Power secures the 
performance. The declarative will is only one 
side ; its complement, the executive will, is the 
living energy in which everything good has its 
origin and existence. So long as we only look at 
the will of God in the former light, as law, we 
feel it a burden, because we have not the power to 
perform — it is too high for us. When faith looks 
to the Power that works in God's will, and carries 
it out, it has the courage to accept it and fulfil it, 



HOLINESS AND THE WHL OF GOD. 267 

because it knows God Himself is working it out. 
The surrender in faith to the Divine will as Wis- 
dom thus becomes the pathway to the experience 
of it as a Power. " He doeth according to His 
will," is then the language not only of forced sub- 
mission, but of joyful expectation. 

"This is the will of God, your sanctification." 
In the ordinary acceptation of these words, they 
simply mean that among many other things that 
God has willed, sanctification is one ; it is some- 
thing in accordance with His will. This thought 
contains teaching of great value. God very dis- 
tinctly and definitely has willed your sanctifica- 
tion: your sanctification has its source and cer- 
tainty in its being God's will. We are *' elect in 
sanctification of the Spirit," " chosen to be holy ; " 
the purpose of God's will from eternity, and His 
will now, is our sanctification. We have only to 
think of what we said of God's will being a 
Divine power that works out what His wisdom 
has chosen, to see what strength this truth will 
give to our faith that we shall be holy : God wills 
it, and will work it out for all and in all who do 
not resist it, but yield themselves to its power. 
Seek your sanctification, not only in the will of 
God, as a declaration of what He wants you to be, 
but as a revelation of what He Himself will work 
out in you. 



268 HOLT IN CHRIST. 

There is, however, another most precious 
thought suggested. If our sanctification be God's 
will, its central thought and its contents, every 
'part of that will must bear upon it, and the sure 
entrance to sanctification will be the hearty 
acceptance of the will of God in all things. To 
be one with God's will is to be holy. Let him 
who would be holy take his place here and 
*'stand in all the will of God." He will there 
meet God Himself, and be made partaker of His 
Holiness, because His will works out its purpose 
in power to each one who yields himself to it. 
Everything in a life of holiness depends upon our 
being in the right relation to the will of God. 

There are many Christians to whom it appears 
impossible to think of their accepting all the will 
of God, or of their being one with it. They look 
upon the will of God in its thousand commands, 
and its numberless providential orderings. They 
have sometimes found it so hard to obey one sin- 
gle command, or to give up willingly to some 
light disappointment. They imagine that they 
would need to be a thousandfold holier and 
stronger in grace, before venturing to say that 
they do accept all God's will, whether to do or to 
bear. They cannot understand that all the diffi- 
culty comes from their not occupying the right 
.standpoint. They are looking at God's will as at 



HOLINESS AND THE WHL OF GOD, 269 

variancf^ with their natural will, and they feel 
that that natural will will never delight in all 
God's will. They forget that the new man has a 
renewed will. This new will delights in the will 
of God, because it is born of it. This new will 
sees the beauty and the glory of God's will, and 
is in harmony with it. If they are indeed God's 
children, the very first impulse of the spirit of a 
child is surely to do the will of the Father in 
heaven. And they have but to yield themselves 
heartily and wholly to this spirit of sonship, and 
they need not fear to accept God's will as theirs. 

The mistake they make is a very serious one, 
Instead of living by faith they judge by feelings 
in which the old nature speaks and rules. It tells 
them that God's will is often a burden too hard to 
be borne, and that they never can have the 
strength to do it. Faith speaks differently. It 
reminds us that God is Love, and that His will is 
nothing but Love revealed. It asks if we do not 
know that there is nothing more perfect or beauti- 
ful in heaven or earth than the will of God. It 
shows us how in our conversion we have already 
professed to accept God as Father and Lord. It 
assures us, above all, that if we will but definitely 
and trustingly give ourselves to that will which is 
Love, it will as Love fill our hearts and make us 
delight in it, and so become the power that 



270 HOLY IJSr CHRIST. 

enables us joyfully to do and to bear. Faith 
reveals to us that the will of God is the power of 
His love, working out its plan in Divine beauty 
in each one who wholly yields to it. 

And which shall we now choose? And where 
shall we take our place? Shall we attempt to 
accept Christ as a Saviour without accepting His 
will ? Shall w^e profess to be the Father's chil- 
dren, and yet spend our life in debating how 
much of His will we shall perform ? Shall we be 
content to go on from day to day with the painful 
consciousness that our will is not in harmony 
with God's will ? Or shall we not at once and for 
ever give up our will as sinful to His, — to that 
Will which He has already written on our heart? 
This is a thing that is possible. It can be done. 
In a simple, definite transaction with God, we 
can say that we do accept His holy will to be 
ours. Faith knows that God will not pass such a 
surrender unnoticed, but accept it. In the trust 
that He now takes us up into His will, and under- 
takes to breathe it into us, with the love and the 
power to perform it — in this faith let us enter 
into God's will, and begin a new life ; standing in, 
abiding in the very centre of this most holy 
will. 

Such an acceptance of God's will prepares the 
believer, through the Holy Spirit, to recognize and 



HOLINESS AND THE WILL OF GOD. 271 

know that will in whatever form it comes. The 
great difference between the carnal and the spirit- 
ual Christian is that the latter acknowledges God, 
under whatever low and poor and human appear- 
ances He manifests Himself. When God comes 
in trials which can be traced to no hand but His, 
he says, ** Thy will be done." When trials come 
through the weakness of men or his own folly, 
when circumstances appear unfavorable to his 
religious progress, and temptations threaten to be 
too much for him and to overcome him, he learns 
first of all to see God in everything, and still to 
say, " Thy will be done." He knows that a child of 
God cannot possibly be in any situation without the 
will of His Heavenly Father, even when that will 
has been to leave him to his own wilfulness for a 
time, or to suffer the consequences of his own or 
others' sin. He sees this, and in accepting his 
circumstances as the will of God to try and prove 
him, he is in the right position for now knowing 
and doing what is right. Seeing and honoring 
God's will thus in everything, he learns always to 
abide in that will. 

He does so also by doing that will. As his 
spiritual discernment grows to say of whatever 
happens, "All things are of God," so he grows too 
in wisdom and spiritual understanding to know 
tlie will of God as it is to be done. In the indica- 



272 HOLT m CHRIST, 

tions of conscience and of Providence, in the 
teaching of the word and the Spirit, he learns to 
see how God's will has reference to every part 
and duty of life, and it becomes his joy, in all 
things, to live, "doing the will of God from the 
heart, as unto the Lord and not unto men.'' 
'' Laboring fervently in prayer to stand complete 
and fully assured in all the will of God," he finds 
how blessedly the Father has accepted his sur- 
render, and supplies all the light and strength 
that is needed that His will may be done by him 
on earth as it is in heaven. 

Let me ask every reader to say to a Holy God, 
whether he has indeed given himself to Him to 
be made holy ? Whether he has accepted, and 
entered into, and is living in, the good and perfect 
will of God? The question is not, whether, when 
affliction comes, he accepts the inevitable and 
submits to a will he cannot resist. But whether 
he has chosen the will of God as his chief good, 
and has taken the life-principle of Christ to be 
his: "I delight to do Thy will, God." This 
was the holiness of Christ, in which He sanctified 
Himself and us, the doing God's will. " In 
which will we have been sanctified." It is this 
will of God which is our sanctification. 

Brother ! are you in earnest to be holy ? 
wholly possessed of God ? Here is the path. I 



HOLINESS AND THE WILL OF GOD. 273 

plead with you not to be afraid or to hold back. 
You have taken God to be your God ; have you 
really taken His will to be your wdll? Oh, think 
of the privilege, the blessedness, of having one 
will with God ! and fear not to surrender yourself 
to it most unreservedly. The will of God is, in 
every part of it, and in all its Divine power, your 
sanctification. 

Be ye holy, as I am holy. 



Blessed Father ! I come to say that I see that 
Thy will is my sanctification, and there alone I 
would seek it. Graciously grant that, by Thy 
Holy Spirit which dwelleth in me, the glory of 
that will, and the blessedness of abiding in it, 
may be fully revealed to me. 

Teach me to know it as the Will of Love, pur- 
posing always what is the very best and most 
blest for Thy child. Teach me to know it as the 
Will of Omnipotence, able to work out its every 
counsel in me. Teach me to know it in Christ, 
fulfilled perfectly on my behalf. Teach me to 
know it as what the Spirit wills and works in 
each one who yields to Him. 

my Father ! I acknowledge Thy claim to 
have Thy will alone done, and am here for it to 
18 



274 HOLY IJSr CHRTST. 

do with me as Thou pleasest. With my whole 
heart I enter into it, to be one with it for ever. 
Thy Holy Spirit can maintain this oneness with- 
out interruption. I trust Thee, my Father, step 
by step, to let the light of Thy will shine in my 
heart and on my path, through that Spirit. 

May this be the holiness in which I live, that 1 
forget and lose self in pleasing and honoring 
Thee. Amen. 

V, 

1. Make it a study, in meditation and prayer and worship, to 
get a full impression of the Majesty, the Perfection, the Glory 
of the Will of God, with the privilege and possibility of living 
in it. 

2. Study it, too, as the expression of an Infinite Love and 
Fatherliness ; its every manifestation full of loving-kindness. 
Every providence is God's will ; whatever happens, meet God 
in it in humble worship. Every precept \s Gods will; meet 
<j}od in it with loving obedience. Every promise is Gods will; 
meet God in it with full trust. A life in the will of God is rest 
and strength and blessing. 

3. And forget not, above all, to believe in its Omnipotent 
Power. He worketh all things after the counsel of His will. 
In nature and those who resist Him, without their consent. In 
His children, according to their faith, and as far as they will it. 
Do believe that the will of God will work out its counsel in 
yon, as you trust it to do so. 

4. This will is Infinite Benevolence and Beneficence revealed 
in the self-sacrifice of Jesus. Live for others: so can you 
become an instrument for the Divine will to use. Matt, xviii. 
14 ; John vi. 39, 40. Yield yourselves to this redeeming will of 
God, that it may get full possession, and work out through you 
loo its saving purpose. 



HOLINESS AND THE WILL OF GOD. 275 

5. Christ is just the embodiment of God's will : He is, God's 
-will done. Abide in Him, by abiding in, by doing heartily and 
always, the will of God. A Christian is, like Christ, a man 
given up to the Will of God. 



276 HOLY m CHRIST. 



TWENTY-SEVENTH DAY. 

HOLY IN CHRIST. 
Ibolineee anD Service^ 

" If a man therefore cleanse himself from these, he shall be a 
vessel unto honor, sanctified^ meet for the Master's use, pre- 
pared unto every good work." — 2 Tira. ii. 21. 

** A holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices. A holy 
nation, that ye may show forth the excellence of Him who 
called you out of darkness into His marvellous light." — 1 Pet. 
ii. 5, 9. 

THROUGH the whole of Scripture we have seen 
that whatever God sanctifies is to be used 
in the service of His Holiness. His Holiness is 
an infinite energy that only finds its rest in mak- 
ing holy : to the revelation of what He is in 
Hiniself, " I the Lord am holy,^^ God continually 
adds the declaration of what He does, " I am the 
Lord that make holy.'^^ Holiness is a burning fire 
that extends itself, that seeks to consume what is 
unholy, and to communicate its own blessedness 
to all that will receive it. Holiness and selfishness, 



HOLIJSTBSS AND SERVICE. 211 

holiness and inactivity, holiness and sloth, holi- 
ness and helplessness, are utterly irreconcilable. 
Whatever we read of as holy, was taken into the 
service of the Holiness of God. 

Let us just look back on the revelation of what 
is holy in Scripture. The seventh day was made 
holy, that in it God might make His people holy. 
The tabernacle was holy, to serve as a dwelling for 
the Holy One, as the centre whence His Holiness 
might manifest itself to the people. His altar was 
most holy, that it might sanctify the gifts laid on 
it. The priests with their garments, the house 
with its furniture and vessels, the sacrifices and 
the blood, — whatever bore the name of holy had a 
use and a purpose. Of Israel, whom God redeemed 
from Egypt that they might be a holy nation, God 
said, " Let my people go, that they may serve me." 
The holy angels, the holy prophets and apostles, 
the holy Scriptures,^all bore the title as having 
been sanctified for the service of God. Our Lord 
speaks of Himself " as the Son, whom the Father 
sanctified and sent into the world." And when He 
says, " I sanctify myself," He adds at once the 
purpose : it is in the service of the Father and His 
redeemed ones, — ^'that they themselves may be 
sanctified in truth." And can it be thought pos- 
sible, now that God, in Christ the Holy One, and 
in the Holy Spirit, is accomplishing His purpose, 



278 HOLT IN CHBI8T. 

and gathering a people of saints, "holy ones,'* 
" made holy in Christ," that now holiness and 
service would be put asunder? Impossible! 
Here first we shall fully realize how essential tliey 
are to each other. Let us try and grasp their 
mutual relation. We are only made holy that we 
may serve. We can only serve as we are holy. 

Holiness is essential to effectual service. In the Old 
Testament we see degrees of holiness, not only in 
the holy places, but as much in the holy persons. 
In the nation, the Levites, the priests, and then the 
High Priest, there is an advance from step to step : 
as in each succeeding stage the circle narrows, and 
the service is more direct and entire, so the holi- 
ness required is higher and more distinct. It is 
even so in this more spiritual dispensation : the 
more of holiness, the greater the fitness for service ; 
the more there is of true holiness, the more there 
is of God, and the more true and deep is the en- 
trance He has had into the soul. The hold He 
has on the soul to use it in His service is more 
complete. 

In the Church of Christ there is a vast amount 
of work done which yields very little fruit. Many 
throw themselves into work in whom there is but 
little true holiness, little of the Holy Spirit. They 
often work most diligently, and, as far as human 
influence is concerned, most successfully. And yet 



HOLINESS AND SEE VICE. 279^ 

true spiritual results in the building up of a holy- 
temple in the Lord are but few. The Lord cannot 
work in them, because He has not the mastery of 
their inner life. His personal indwelling and fel- 
lowship, the rest of His Holy Presence, His Holi- 
ness reigning and ruling in the heart and life, — to 
all these they are comparative strangers. It has 
been rightly said that work is the cure for spiritual 
poverty and disease ; to some believers who had 
been seeking holiness apart from service, the call 
to work has. been an unspeakable blessing. But 
to many it has only been an additional blind to 
cover up the terrible want of heart-holiness and 
heart-fellowship with the living God. They have 
thrown themselves into work more earnestly than 
ever, and yet have not in their heart the rest-giv- 
ing and refreshing witness that their work is ac- 
ceptable and accepted. 

My brother ! listen to the message. " If a man 
cleanse himself, he shall be a vessel unto honor, 
sanctified, meet for the Ma-ster's use, prepared unto 
every good work." You cannot have the law of 
service more clearly or beautifully laid down. A 
vessel of honor, one whom the King will delight 
to honor, must be a vessel cleansed from all de- 
filement of flesh and spirit. Then only can it be 
a sanctified vessel, possessed and indwelt by God's 
Holy Spirit. So it becomes meet for the Master^s 



280 HOLT IN CHRIST, 

use. He can use it, and work in it, and wield it. 
And so, clean and holy, and yielded into the 
Master's hands, we are Divinely prepared for 
every good work. Holiness is essential to service. 
If service is to be acceptable to God, and effectual 
for its work on souls, and to be a joy and a strength 
to ourselves, we must be holy. The will of God 
must first live in us, if it is to be done by us. 

How many faithful workers there are, mourning 
the want of power; longing and praying for it, 
and yet not obtaining it! They have spent their 
strength more in the outer court of work and ser- 
vice, than in the inner life of fellowship and faith. 
They truly have never understood that only as the 
Master gets possession of them, as the Holy 
Spirit has them at His disposal, can He use 
them, can they have true power. They often long 
and cry for what they call a baptism of power. 
They forget that the way to have God's power in 
us is for ourselves to be in His power. Put your- 
self into the power of God ; let His holy will live 
in you ; live in it and in obedience to it, as one 
who has no power to dispose of himself; let the 
Holy Spirit dwell within, as in His Holy Temple, 
revealing the Holy One on the throne, ruling all ; 
He will without fail use you as a vessel of honor, 
sanctified and meet for the Master's use. Holiness 
is essential to effectual service. 



HOLINESS AND SERVICE, 281 

And service is no less essential to true holiness. 
We have repeated it so often: Holiness is an en- 
ergy, an intense energy of desire and self-sacrifice, 
to make others partakers of its own purity and 
perfection. Christ sacrificed Himself — wherein 
did that sacrifice consist, and what was its aim? 
He sanctified Himself that we might be sanctified 
too. A holiness that is selfish is a delusion. 
True holiness, God's holiness in us, works itself 
out in love, in seeking and loving the unholy, that 
they may become holy too. Self-sacrificing love 
is of the very essence of holiness. The Holy One 
of Israel is its Redeemer. The Holy One of God 
is the dying Saviour. The Holy Spirit of God 
makes holy. There is no holiness in God but 
what is most actively engaged in loving and saving 
and blessing. It must be so in us too. Let every 
thought of holiness, every act of faith or prayer, 
every efi'ort in pursuit of it, be animated by the 
desire and the surrender to the Holiness of God 
for use in the attaining of its object. Let your 
whole life be one distinctly and definitely given 
up to God for His use and service. Your circum- 
stances may appear to be unfavorable. God may 
appear to keep the door closed against your work- 
ing for Him in the way you would wish ; your 
sense of unfitness may be painful. Still, let it 
be a matter settled between God and the soul, that 



282 HOLT IN CUEIST. 

your longing for holiness is that you ma}'' be fitter 
for Him to use, and that what He has given you 
of His Holiness in Christ and the Spirit is all at 
His disposal, waiting to be used. Be ready for Him 
to use; live out, in a daily life of humble, self- 
denying, loving service of others, what grace you 
have received. You will find that in the union 
and interchange of worship and work, God's Holi- 
ness will rest upon you. 

"The Father sanctified the Son, and sm^ Him 
into the world." The world is the place for the 
sanctified one, to be its light, its salt, its life. We 
are '^sanctified in Christ Jesus," and sent into the 
world too. Oh, let us not fear to accept our position 
— our double position ; in the world, and in Christ I 
In the world, with its sin and sorrow, with its 
thousands of needs touching us at every point, and 
its millions of souls all waiting for us. And in 
Christ too. For the sake of that world we " have 
been sanctified in Christ," we are ''holy in Christ," 
we have "the spirit of sanctification " dwelling in 
us. As a holy salt is a sinful world, let us give 
ourselves to our holy calling. Let us come nearer 
and nearer to God who has called us. Let us root 
deeper and deeper in Christ our sanctificatian, in 
whom we are of God. Let us enter more firmly 
and more fully into that faith in Him in whom 
we are, by which our whole life will be covered 



HOLINESS AND SERVICE. 28S 

and taken up in His. Let us beseech the Father 
to teach us that His Holy Spirit does dwell in us 
every moment, making, if we live by faith, Christ 
with His Holiness, our home, our abode, our sure 
defence, and our infinite supply. As He which 
hath called us is holy, let us be holy in His own 
Son, through His own Spirit, and the fire of His 
Holy Love will work through us its work of 
judging and condemning, of saving and sancti- 
fying. A sanctified soul God will use to save. 



Be ye holy, as I am holy. 



Blessed Master ! I thank Thee for being anew 
reminded of the purpose of Thy Redeeming Love. 
Thou gavest Thyself that Thou mightest cleanse 
for Thyself a people of Thine own, zealous in good 
works. Thou wouldest make of each of us a 
vessel of honor, cleansed and sanctified, meet for 
Thy use, and prepared for every good work. 

Blessed Lord ! write the lessons of Thy word 
deep in my heart. Teach me and all Thy people 
that if we would work for Thee, if we w^ould have 
Thee work in us, and use us, we must be very 
holy, holy as God is holy. And that if we w^ould 
be holy, we must be serving Thee. It is Thy own 



284 HOLT m CHBIST. 

Spirit, by which Thou dost sanctify us to use us, 
and dost sanctify in using. To be entirely pos- 
sessed of Thee is the path to sanctity and service 
both. 

Most Holy Saviour ! we are in Thee as our sanc- 
tification : in Thee we would abide. In the rest 
of a faith that trusts Thee for all, in the power of 
a surrender that would have no will but Thine, 
in a love that would lose itself to be wholly Thine, 
Blessed Jesus, we do abide in Thee. In Thee we 
are holy : in Thee we shall bear much fruit. 

Oh, be pleased to perfect Thine own work in us ! 
Amen. 

1. It is difficult to make it clear in words how growth in 
holiness will simply reveal itself as an increasing simplicity and 
self-forgetfulnesa, accompanied by the restful and most blessed 
assurance that God has complete possession of us and will use us. 
We pass from the stage in which work presses as an obligation; 
it becomes the joy of fruit-bearing; faith's assurance that He is 
working out His will through us. 

2. It has sometimes been said that people might be better em- 
ployed in working for God than attending Holiness Conven- 
tions. This is surely a misunderstanding. It was before the 
throne of the Thrice Holy One, and as he heard the Seraphim 
«ing of God's Holiness, that the prophet said, ** Here am I, send 
me/' As the mission of Moses, and Isaiah, and the Son, whom 
the Father sanctified and sent, each had its origin in the revela- 
tion of God's Holiness, our missions will receive new power as 
they are more directly born out of the worship of God as the 
Holy One, and baptized into the Spirit of Holiness. 

3. Let every worker take time to hear God's double call. If 



HOLINESS AND SERVICE. 285 

you would work, be very holy. If you would be holy, give 
yourself to God to use in His work. 

4. Note the connection between "sanctified" and "meet for 
the Master's use.^' True holiness is being possessed of God ; 
true service being used of God. How much service there is in 
which we are the chief agents, and ask God to help and to bless 
us. True service is being yielded up to the Master for Him to 
use. Then the Holy Ghost is the Agent, and we are the instru- 
ments of His will. Such service is Holiness. 

5. " I sanctify Myself, that they also : '* a reference to others, 
is the root-principle of all true holiness. 



286 HOLY IN CHRIST. 



TWENTY-EIGHTH DAY. 



HOLY IN CHRIST. 
Zhc Timai2 Into tbe ftolieet* 

" Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the Holiest 
by the blood of Jesus, by the way which He dedicated, a new 
and living way, through the veil, that is to say, His flesh : and 
having a great Priest over the house of God ; let us draw near 
with a true heart, in fulness of faith." — Heb. x. 19-22. 

WHEN the High Priest once a year entered 
into the second tabernacle within the veil, 
it was, we are told in the Epistle to the Hebrews, 
^' the Holy Ghost signifying that the way into the 
Holiest of all was not yet made manifest." When 
Christ died, the veil was rent ; all who were serv- 
ing in the holy place had free access at once into 
the Most Holy ; the way into the Holiest of all 
was opened up. When the Epistle passes over to 
its practical application (x. 19), all its teaching is 
summed up in the words : " Having therefore, 
brethren, boldness to enter into the Holiest, let us 



THE WAY INTO THE HOLIEST 287 

draw near." Christ's redemption has opened the 
way to the Holiest of all : our acceptance of it 
must lead to nothing less than our drawing near 
and entering in. The words of our text suggest 
to us four very precious thoughts in regard to the 
place of access, the right of access, the way of ac- 
cess, the power of access. 

The "place of access. Whither are we invited to 
draw nigh ? " Having boldness to enter into the 
HoliesV The priests in Israel might enter the 
holy place, but were always kept excluded from the 
Holiest, God's immediate presence. The rent veil 
proclaimed liberty of access into that Presence. It 
is there that believers as a royal priesthood are 
now to live and walk. Within the veil, in the 
very Holiest of all, in the same place, the heaven- 
lies, in which God dwells, in God's very Presence, 
is to be our abode — our home. Some speak as if 
the, " Let us draw near," meant prayer, and that 
in our special approach to God in acts of worship 
w^e enter the Holiest. No ; great as this privilege 
is, God has meant something for us infinitely 
greater. We are to draw near, and dwell always, 
to live our life and do our work within the sphere, 
the atmosphere, of the inner sanctuary. It is 
God's Presence makes holy ground ; God's im- 
mediate Presence in Christ makes any place the 
Holiest of all : and this is it into which we are to 



288 HOLY IN CHBIST. 

draw nigh, and in which we are to abide. There 
is not a single moment of the day, there is not a 
circumstance or surrounding, in which the be- 
liever may not be kept dwelling in the secret place 
of the Most High. As by faith he enters into the 
completeness of his reconciliation with God, and 
the reality of his oneness with Christ, as he thus, 
abiding in Christ, yields to the Holy Spirit to re- 
veal within the Presence of the Holy One, the 
Holiest of all is around him, he is indeed in it. 
With an uninterrupted access he draws near.^ 

The right of access. The thought comes up, and 
the question is asked : Is this not simply an ideal ? 
can it be a reality, an experience in daily life to 
those who know how sinful their nature is? 
Blessed be God ! it is meant to be. It is possible, 
because our right of access rests not in what we 
are, but in the blood of Jesus. " Having boldness 
to enter into the Holiest hy the blood of Jesus, let 
us draw near," In the Passover we saw how 
redemption, and the holiness it aimed at, were de- 
pendent on the blood. In the sanctuary, God's 
dwelling, we know how in each part, the court, 
the holy place, the Most Holy, the sprinkling of 

1 So near, so very near to God, 
I cannot nearer be ; 
For in the person of His Son, 
I am as near as He. 



THE WAY INTO THE HOLIEST. 289 

blood was what alone secured access to God. 
And now that the blood of Jesus has been shed — 
oh ! in what Divine power, what intense reality, 
what everlasting efficacy, we now have access into 
the Holiest of all, the Most Holy of God's heart 
and His love! We are indeed brought nigh by 
the blood. We have boldness to enter by the 
blood. " The worshippers, being once cleansed, 
have no more conscience of sins." Walking in 
the light, the blood of Jesus cleanses in the power 
of an endless life, with a cleansing that never 
ceases. No consciousness of unworthiness or 
remaining sinfulness need hinder the boldness of 
access: the liberty to draw near rests in the 
never-failing, ever-acting, ever-living efficacy of 
the Precious Blood. It is possible for a believer 
to dwell in the Holiest of all. 

The way of access. It is often thought that 
what is said of the new and living way^ dedicated 
for us by Jesus, means nothing different from the 
boldness through His blood. This is not the 
case. The words mean a great deal more. " Hav- 
ing boldness hy the blood of Jesus, let us draw near 
hy the way which He dedicated for us." That is, 
He opened for us a way to walk in, as He walked 
in it, *' a new and living way, through the veil, 
that is to say, His flesh." The way in which 
Christ walked when He gave His blood, is the 
19 



290 HOLT m CHRIST. 

very same in which we must walk too. That way 
is the way of the Cross. There must not only be 
faith in Christ's sacrifice, but fellowship with Him 
in it. That way led to the rending of the veil of 
the flesh, and so through the rent veil of the 
flesh, in to God. And was the veil of Christ's 
holy flesh rent that the veil of our sinful flesh 
might be spared ? Verily, no. He meant us to 
walk in the very same way in which He did, fol- 
lowing closely after Himself. He dedicated for 
us a new and living way through the veil, that is. 
His flesh. As we go in through the rent veil of His 
fleshy we find in it at once the need and the power 
for our flesh being rent too : following Jesus ever 
means conformity to Jesus. It is Jesus with the 
rent flesh, in whom we are, in whom we walk.^ 
There is no way to God but through the rending 
of the flesh. In acceptance of Christ's life and 
death by faith as the power that works in us, in 
the power of the Spirit which makes us truly one 
with Christ, we all follow Christ as He passes on 
through the rent veil, that is. His flesh, and 
become partakers with Him of His crucifixion 

^ " Christ suffered, that He might bring us to God, being put 
to death in the flesh, but quickened in the Spirit." *' Foras- 
much then as Christ suffered in the flesh, arm ye yourselves also 
with the same mind." The flesh and the Spirit are antago- 
nistic : as the flesh dies, the Spirit lives. 



THE WAT INTO THE HOLIEST. 291 

and death. The way of the cross, " by which I 
have been crucified," is the way through the rent 
veil. Man's destiny, fellowship with God in the 
power of the Holy Spirit, is only reached through 
the sacrifice of the flesh. 

And here we find now the solution of a great 
mystery — why so many Christians remain stand- 
ing afar off, and never enter this Holiest of all : 
why the holiness of God's Presence is so little 
seen on them. They thought that it was only in 
Christ that the flesh needed to be rent, not in 
themselves. They thought that the liberty they 
had in the blood was the new and living way. 
They knew not that the way into true and full 
holiness, into the Holiest of all, that the full 
entrance into the fellowship of the holiness of the 
Great High Priest, was only to be reached through 
the rent veil of the flesh, through conformity to 
the death of Jesus. This is in very deed the way 
He dedicated for us. He is Himself the way; 
into His self-denial, His self-sacrifice, His cruci- 
fixion. He takes up all who long to be holy with 
His Holiness, holy as He is holy. 

The power of access. Does any one shrink back 
from entering the very Holiest for fear of this 
rending of the flesh, because he doubts whether he 
could bear it, whether he could indeed walk in 
such a path ? Let him listen once more. Hear 



292 HOLY m CHRIST. 

what follows : "And having a Great Priest over 
the House of God, let us draw near." We have 
not only the Holiest of all inviting us, and the 
blood giving us boldness, and the way through 
the rent veil consecrated for us, but the Great 
Priest over the House of God, the Blessed Living 
Saviour, to draw, to help, and to welcome us. 
He is our Aaron. On His heart we see our name, 
because He only lives to think of us, and pray for 
us. On His forehead we see God's name, " Holy 
to the Lord," because in His Holiness the sins of 
our holy things are covered. In Him we are 
accepted and sanctified ; God receives us as holy 
ones. In the power of His love and His Spirit, 
in the power of Him the Holy One, in the joy of 
drawing nearer to Him and being drawn by Him, 
we gladly accept the way He has dedicated, and 
walk in His holy footsteps of self-denial and self- 
sacrifice. We see how the flesh is the thick veil 
that separates from the Holy One who is a Spirit, 
and it becomes an unceasing and most fervent 
prayer, that the crucifixion of the flesh may, in 
the power of the Holy Spirit, be in us a blessed 
reality. With the glory of the Holiest of all 
shining out on us through the opened veil, and 
the Precious Blood speaking so loudly of boldness 
of access, and the Great Priest beckoning us with 
His loving Presence to draw near and be blessed, 



THE WAY INTO THE HOLIEST. 293 

— with all this, we dare no longer fear, but choose 
the way of the rent veil as the path we love to 
tread, and give ourselves to enter in and dwell 
within the veil, in the very Holiest of all. 

And so our life here will be the earnest of the 
glory that is to come, as it is written — note how 
we have the four great thoughts of our text over 
again — ^' These are they which came out of great 
tribulation," that is, by the way of the rent flesh; 
•^ and they washed their robes, and made them 
white in the blood of the Lamb," their boldness 
through the blood ; ^' therefore are they before 
the throne of God," their dwelling in the Holiest 
of all ; '' the Lamb, which is in the midst of the 
throne, shall be their Shepherd," the Great Priest 
still the Shepherd, Jesus Himself their all in all. 

Brother ! do you see what holiness is, and how 
it is to be found ? It is not something wrought in 
yourself. It is not something put on you from 
without. Holiness is the Presence of God resting 
on you. Holiness comes as you consciously abide 
in the Presence, doing all your work, and living 
• all your life as a sacrifice to Him, acceptable 
through Jesus Christ, sanctified by the Holy 
Ghost. Oh, be no longer fearful, as if this life 
were not for you ! Look to Jesus ; having a Great 
Priest over the House of God, let us draw near. 
Be occupied with Jesus. Our Brother has charge 



294 HOLY IN C HEIST, 

of the Temple ; He has liberty to show us all, to 
lead us into the secret of the Father's presence. 
The entire management of the Temple has been 
given into His hands with this very purpose, that 
all the feeble and doubting ones might come with * 
confidence. Only trust yourself to Jesus, to His 
leading and keeping. Only trust Jesus, God's 
Holy One, your Holy One; it is His delight to 
reveal to you what He has purchased with His 
blood. Trust Him to teach you the ordinances 
of the sanctuary. " That thou mayest know how 
thou oughtest to behave thyself in the House of 
God," He has been given. Having a Great Priest^ 
let us enter in, let us dwell in the Holiest of all. 
In the power of the blood, in the power of the 
new and living way, in the power of the Living 
Jesus, let the Holiest of all, the Presence of God, 
be the home of our soul. You are " Holy in 
Christ ; " in Christ you are in God's Holy Presence 
and Love ; just stay there. 

Be holy, for I am holy. 



Most Holy God ! how shall I praise Thee for 
the liberty to enter into the Holiest of all, and 
dwell there? And for the precious Blood, that 
brings us nigh ? And for the new and living 



THE WAT INTO THE HOLIEST 295 

way, through the rent veil of that flesh which had 
separated us from Thee, in which my flesh now 
too has been crucified ? And for the Great Priest 
over the House of God, our Living Lord Jesus, 
with Whom and in Whom we appear before 
Thee? Glory be to Thy Holy Name for this 
wonderful and most complete redemption. 

I beseech Thee, O my God ! give me, and all 
Thy children, some right sense of how really and 
surely we may live each day, may spend our 
whole life, within the veil, in Thine own Imme- 
diate Presence. Give us the spirit of revelation, 
I pray Thee, that we may see how, through the 
rent veil, the glory of Thy Presence streameth 
forth from the Most Holy into the holy place; 
how, in the pouring out of the Holy Spirit, the 
kingdom of heaven came to earth, and all who 
yield themselves to that Spirit may know that 
in Christ they are indeed so near, so very near to 
Thee. O Blessed Father ! let Thy Spirit teach us 
that this indeed is the holy life : a life in Christ 
the Holy One, always in the Light and the Pres- 
ence of Thy Hol}^ Majesty. 

Most Holy God ! I draw nigh. In the power of 
the Holy Spirit I enter in. I am now in the 
Holiest of all. And here I would abide in Jesus, 
my Great Priest — here, in the Holiest of all. 
Amen. 



296 HOLY IJSr CHBI8T. 

1. To abide in Christ is to dwell in the Holiest of all. 
Christ is not only the Sacrifice, and the Way, and the Great 
Priest, but also Himself the Temple. *' The Lamb is the 
Temple.'' As the Holy Spirit reveals my union to Christ more 
clearly, and heart and will lose themselves in Him, I dwell in 
ihe Holy Presence, which is the Holiest of all. You are " holy 
in Christ" — draw near, enter in with boldness, and take posses- 
sion — have no home but in the Holiest of all. 

2. '' Christ loved the Church, and gave Himself for it, that 
He might sanctify it." He gave Himself ! Have you caught 
the force of that word ? Because He would have no one else do 
it, because none could do it; to sanctify His church. He gave 
Himself to do it. And so it is His own special beloved work to 
sanctify the Church He loved. Just accept Himself to do it. 
He can and will make you holy, that He may present you to 
Himself glorious, without spot or wrinkle. Let that word 
Himself live in you. The whole life and walk in the House of 
God is in His charge. Having a Great Priest, let us draw near. 

3. This entrance into the Holiest of all — an ever fresh and 
ever deeper entrance — is, at the same time, an ever blessed 
resting in the Father's Presence. Faith in the blood, following 
in the way of the rent flesh, and fellowship with the Living 
Jesus, are the three chief steps. 

4. Enter into the Holiest of all, and dwell there. It will 
enter into thee, and transform thee, and dwell in thee. And 
thy heart will be the Holiest of all, in which He dwells. 

5. Have we not at times been lifted, by an effort of thought 
and will, or in the fellowship of the saints, into what seemed 
the Holiest of all, and speedily felt that the flesh had entered 
there too ? It was because we entered not by the new way of 
life — the way through death to life — the way of the rent veil of 
the flesh. O our crucified Lord ! teach us what this means ; 
give it us ; be it Thyself to us. 

6. Let me remember that my access into the Holiest is as a 
Priest. Let me dwell before the Lord all the day as an Inter- 



THE WAY INTO THE HOLIEST 297 

cessor, offering, uuceasingly, pleadings which are acceptable in 
Christ. May God's Church be like her of whom it is written, 
"She departed not from the temple, but served God with fast- 
ings and prayers night and day/' It is for this we have access 
to the Holiest of all- 



298 HOLY IN CHRIST. 



TWENTY-NINTH DAY. 



HOLY IN CHRIST. 
Iboltnees anD CbaBttsement. 

"He chasteneth us for our profit, that we may be partakers 
of His holiness. Follow after sanctification, without which no 
man shall see the Lord/' — Heb. xii. 10, 14. 

THERE is perhaps no part of God's word which 
sheds such Divine light upon suffering as the 
Epistle to the Hebrews. It does this because it 
teaches us what suffering was to the Son of God. 
It perfected His humanity. It so fitted Him for 
His work as the Compassionate High Priest. It 
proved that He, who had fulfilled God's will in 
suffering obedience, was indeed worthy to be its 
executor in glory, and to sit down on the right 
hand of the Majesty on high. " It became God. 
in bringing many sons unto glory, to make the 
Author of their salvation perfect through sufferings^ 
" Though He was a Son, yet learned He obedience by 
the things which He suffered^ and having been 



HOLINESS AND CHASTISEMENT. 299 

made 'perfect^ became the Author of eternal salva- 
tion to all them that obey Him." As He said 
Himself of His suffering, '' I sanctify myself," so 
we see here that His sufferings were indeed to Him 
the pathway to perfection and holiness. 

What Christ was and won was all for us. The 
power which suffering was proved to have in Him 
to work out perfection, the power which He im- 
parted to it in sanctifying Himself through suffer- 
ing, is the power of the new life that comes from 
Him to us. In the light of His example we can 
see, in the faith of His power we too can prove, 
that suffering is to God's child the token of the 
Father's love, and the channel of His richest bless- 
ing. To such faith the apparent mystery of suffer- 
ing is seen to be nothing but a Divine need — the 
light affliction that works out — yea, toorfo out and 
actually effects the exceeding weight of glory. We 
agree not only to what is written, " It became Him 
to make the Author of salvation perfect through 
suffering," but understand somewhat how Divinely 
becoming and meet it is that we too should be 
sanctified by suffering. 

" He chasteneth us for our profit, that we should 
be made partakers of His holiness." Of all the 
precious words Holy Scripture has for the sorrow- 
ful, there is hardly one that leads us more directly 
and more deeply into the fulness of blessing that 



300 HOLY m CHRIST. 

suffering is meant to bring. It is His Holiness^ God's 
own Holiness, we are to be made partakers of. 
The Epistle had spoken very clearly of our sancti- 
fication from its Divine side, as wrought out for 
us, and to be wrought in us, by Jesus Himself. 
" He which sanctifieth and they which are sancti- 
fied are all of one." " We have been sanctified by 
the one off'ering of Christ." In our text we have 
the other side, the progressive work by which we 
are personally to accept and voluntarily to appro- 
priate this Divine Holiness. In view of all there 
is in us that is at variance with God's will, and 
that must be discovered and broken down, before 
we understand what it is to give up our will and 
delight in God's ; in view of the personal fellow- 
ship of suffering which alone can lead to the full 
appreciation of what Jesus bore and did for us ; 
in view, too, of the full personal entrance into and 
satisfaction with the love of God as our sufficient 
portion ; chastisement and suffering are indis- 
pensable elements in God's work of making holy. 
In these three aspects we shall see how what the 
Son needed is what we need, how what was of 
such unspeakable value to the Son will to us be no 
less rich in blessing. 

Chastisement leads to the acceptance of GocVs will. 
We have seen how God's will is our sanctification ; 
how it is in the will of God Christ has sanctified 



HOLmESS AND CHASTISEMENT, 301 

US ; yea more, how He found the power to sanctify^ 
us in sanctifying Himself by the entire surrender 
of His will to God. His ^'I delight to do Thy 
will '^ derived its worth from His continual " Not 
my will.'' And wherever God comes with chas- 
tisement or suffering, the very first object He has 
in view is, to ask and to work in us union with 
His own blessed will, that through it we may 
have union with Himself and His love. He comes 
in some one single point in which His will crosses 
our most cherished affection or desire, and ask& 
the surrender of what we will to what He wills. 
When this is done willingly and lovingly, He leada 
the soul on to see how the claim for the sacrifice 
in the individual matter is the assertion of a prin- 
ciple — that in everything His will is to be our 
one desire. Happy the soul to whom affliction i& 
not a series of single acts of conflict and submis- 
sion to single acts of His will, but an entrance 
into the school where we prove and approve all 
the good and perfect and acceptable will of God. 

It has sometimes appeared, even to God's chil- 
dren, as if affliction were not a blessing : it so 
rouses the evil nature, and calls forth all the op- 
position of the heart against God's will, that it has 
brought the loss of the peace and the piety that 
once appeared to reign. Even in such cases it is 
working out God's purpose. "That He might 



302 HOLY IN CHRIST. 

humble thee, to prove thee, to know what was 
in thine heart," is still His object in leading into 
the wilderness. To an extent we are not aware of, 
our religion is often selfish and superficial : when 
we accept the teaching of chastisement in discov- 
ering the self-will and love of the world which 
still prevails, we have learnt one of its first and 
most needful lessons. 

This lesson has special difficulty when the trial 
does not come direct from God, but through men 
or circumstances. In looking at second causes, 
and in seeking for their removal, in the feeling 
of indignation or of grief, we often entirely for- 
get to see God's will in everything His Providence 
allows. As long as we do so, the chastisement is 
fruitless; and perhaps only hardens the more. If, 
in our study of the pathway of Holiness, there has 
been awakened in us the desire to accept and 
adore, and stand complete in, all the will of God, 
let us in the very first place seek to recognize that 
will in everything that comes on us. The sin of 
him who vexes us is not God's will. But it is 
God's will that we should be in that position of dif- 
ficulty to be tried and tested. Let our first thought 
be : this position of difficulty is my Father's will 
for me : I accept that will as my place now where 
He sees it fit to try me. Such acceptance of the 
trial is the way to turn it into blessing. It will 



HOLINESS AND CHASTISEMENT, 303 

lead onto an ever clearer abiding in all the will 
of God all the day. 

Chastisement leads to the fellowship of God?s Son. 
The will of God out of Christ is a law we cannot 
fulfil. The will of God in Christ is a life that fills 
us. He came in the name of our fallen humanity, 
and accepted all God's will as it rested on us, both 
in the demands of the law, and in the conse- 
quences which sin had brought upon man. He 
gave Himself entirely to God's will, whatever it 
cost Him. And so he paved for us a way through 
suffering, not only through it in the sense of past 
it and out of it, but by means and in virtue of it, 
into the love and glory of the Father. And it is 
in the power which Christ gives in fellowship with 
Himself that we too can love the way of the Cross, 
as the best and most blessed way to the Crown. 
Scripture says that the will of God is our sanctifi- 
cation, and also that Christ is our Sanctification. 
It is only in Christ that we have the power to love 
and rejoice in the will of God. In Him we have 
the power. He became our Sanctification once for 
all by delighting to do that will ; He becomes our 
Sanctification in personal experience, by teaching 
us to delight to do it. He learned to do it ; He 
could not become perfect in doing it otherwise 
than by sufi*ering. In suffering He draws nigh ; 
He makes our sufi'ering the fellowship of His suf- 



304 HOLT IN CHRIST. 

fering ; and in it makes Himself, who was per- 
fected through suffering, our Sanctification. 

ye suffering ones ! all ye whom the Father is 
chastening! come and see Jesus suffering, giving 
up His will, being made perfect, sanctifying Him- 
self. His suffering is the secret of His Holiness, of 
His Glory, of His Life, Will you not thank God 
for anything that can admit you into the nearer 
fellowship of your blessed Lord ? Shall we not 
accept every trial, great or small, as the call of His 
love to be one with Himself in living only for 
God's will. This is Holiness, to be one with Jesus 
as He does the will of God, to abide in Jesus who 
was made perfect through suffering. 

Chastisement leads to the enjoyment of GocTs love. 
Many a father has been surprised as he made his 
first experience of how a child, after being punished 
in love, began to cling to him more tenderly than 
before. Even so, while to those who live at a dis- 
tance from their Father, the misery in this world 
appears to be the one thing that shakes their faith 
in God's Love, it is just through suffering that His 
children learn to know the Reality of that Love. 
The chastening is so distinctly a father's preroga- 
tive ; it leads so directly to the confession of its 
needfulness and its lovingness ; it wakens so pow- 
erfully the longing for pardon and comfort and 
deliverance, that it does indeed become, strange 



HOLINESS AND CHASTISEMENT. 305 

though this may seem, one of the surest guides 
into the deeper experience of the Divine Love. 
Chastening is the school in which the blessed les- 
son is learnt that the will of God is all Love, and 
that Holiness is the fire of Love, consuming that 
it may purify, destroying the dross only that it 
may assimilate into its own perfect purity all that 
yields itself to the wondrous change. 

" We know and have believed the love which 
God hath in us. God is love : and he that abideth 
in love abideth in God, and God in Him." Man's 
destiny is fellowship with God, the fellowship, the 
mutual indwelling of love. It is only by faith 
that this Love of God can be known. And faith 
can only grow by exercise, can only thrive in 
trial : when visible things fail, its energy is roused 
to yield itself to be possessed by the Invisible, by 
the Divine. Chastisement is the nurse of faith ; 
one of its chosen attendants, to lead deeper into 
the Love of God. This is the new and living way, 
the way of the rent flesh in fellowship with Jesus 
leading up into the Holiest of all. There it is 
seen how the Justice that will not spare the child^ 
and the Love that sustains and sanctifies it, are 
both one in the Holiness of God. 

ye chastened saints! who are so specially 
being led in the way that goes through the rent 
veil of the flesh, you have boldness to enter in. 
20 



306 HOLT IN CHRIST. 

Draw near; come and dwell in the Holiest of all. 
Make your abode in the Holiest of all : there you ^ 
are made partakers of His Holiness. Chastise- 
ment is bringing your heart into unity with God's 
Will, God's Son, God's Love. Abide in God's 
Will. Abide in God's Son. Abide in God's Love. 
Dwell, within the veil, in the Holiest of all. 



•'J 



Be YE HOLY, AS I AM HOLY. 



Most Holy God ! once again I bless Thee for the 
wondrous revelation of Thy Holiness. Not only 
have I heard Thee speak, " I am holy," but Thou 
hast invited me to fellowship with Thyself: *'Be 
holy, as I am holy. " Blessed be Thy name ! I have 
heard more even : " I make holy," is Thy word of 
promise, pledging Thine own Power to work out 
the purpose of Thy Love. I do thank Thee for 
what Thou hast revealed in Thy Son, in Thy 
Spirit, in Thy Word, of the path of Holiness. 
But how shall I bless Thee for the lesson of this 
day, that there is not a loss or sorrow, not a pain 
or care, not a temptation or trial, but Thy love 
also means it, and makes it, to be a help in work- 
ing out the holiness of Thy people. Through each 
Thou drawest to Thyself, that they may taste 



H0LINE88 AND CHASTISEMENT. 307 

how, in accepting Thy Will of Love, there is 
blessing and deliverance. 

Blessed Father! Thou knowest how often I 
have looked upon the circumstances and the diffi- 
culties of this life as hindrances. Oh, let them 
all, in the light of Thy holy purpose to make us 
partakers of Thy Holiness, in the light of Thy 
Will and Thy Love, from this hour He helps. 
Let, above all, the path of Thy Blessed Son, prov- 
ing how suffering is the discipline of a Father's 
love, and surrender the secret of holiness, and 
sacrifice the entrance to the Holiest of all, be so 
revealed that in the power of His Spirit and His 
grace that path may become mine. Let even 
chastening, even the least, be from Thine own 
hand, making me partaker of Thy Holiness, 
Amen. 

1. How wonderful the revelation in the Epistle to the He- 
brews of the holiness and the holy making power of suffering, 
as seen in the Son of God ! " He learned obedience by the 
things which He suffered.*' '* It became God to make the 
Author of our salvation perfect through suffering, for both He 
that sanctifieth and they who are sanctified are all of one/' " In 
that He Himself hath suffered, He is able to succor,'^ " We 
behold Jesus, because of the suffering of death, crowned with 
glory and honor." Suffering is the way of 'the rent veil, the 
new and living way Jesus walked in and opened for us. Let 
all sufferers study this. Let all who are '* holy in Christ " here 
learn to know the Christ in whom they are holy, and the way 
in which He sanctified Himself and sanctifies us. 



308 HOLT IJSr CHRIST. 

2. If we begin by realizing the sympathy of Jesus with us in 
our suffering, it will lead us on to what is more : sympathy 
with Jesus in His suffering, fellowship with Him to suffer even 
as He did. 

3. Let suffering and holiness be inseparably linked, as in 
God's mind and in Christ's person, so in your life through the 
Spirit. " It became God to make Him perfect through suffer- 
ing ; for both He that sanctifieth and they who are sanctified 
are all of one.'* Let every ^rtaZ, small or great, be the touch of 
God's hand, laying hold on you, to lead you to holiness. Give 
yourself into that hand. 

4. " Insomuch as ye are partakers of Christ's sufferings, re- 
joice ; for the Spirit of glory and of God resteth on you." 



THE UNCTION FROM THE HOLY ONE. 309 



THIRTIETH DAY. 



HOLY IN CHRIST, 
^be IDinctfon from tbe 1boli2 ©ne* 

"And ye have an anointing from the Holy One, and ye know 
all things. And as for you, the anointing which ye received 
of Him, abideth in you, and ye need not that any one teach 
you ; but as His anointing teacheth you concerning all things, 
and is true, and is no lie, and even as it hath taught you, ye 
abide in Him."— 1 John ii. 20, 27. 

IN the revelation by Moses of God's Holiness 
and His way of making holy, the priests, and 
specially the high priests, were the chief expres- 
sion of God's Holiness in man. In the priests 
themselves, the holy anointing oil was the one 
great symbol of the grace that made holy. Moses 
was to make an holy anointing oil : "And thou 
shalt take of the anointing oil, and sprinkle it 
upon Aaron and upon his sons, and he shall be 
hallowed, and his sons with him." "This shall 
be an holy anointing oil unto me. Upon man's 



310 HOLY IJSr CEHTST. 

flesh shall it not be poured ; neither shall ye 
make any other like it ; it is holy, it shall be holy 
unto you." Exod. xxix. 21, xxx. 25-32. With 
this the priests, and specially the high priests, 
were to be anointed and consecrated : '• He that is 
the high priest among you, upon whose head the 
anointing oil was poured, shall not go out of the 
holy place, nor profane the holy place of his God ; 
for the crown of the anointing oil of his God is upon 
him." Lev. xxi. 10, 12. And even so it is said 
of David, as type of the Messiah, " Our king is of 
the Holy One of Lsrael. I have found David, my 
servant: with my holy oil have I anointed him." 

We know how the Hebrew name Messiah, and 
the Greek Christ, has reference to this. So, in the 
passage just quoted, the Hebrew is, " With my 
holy oil I have messiahed him." And so in a 
passage like Acts x. 38 : " Concerning Jesus of 
Nazareth, whom God christed with the Holy Ghost 
and with power." Or Ps, xlv. : '* God hath mes- 
siahed thee with the oil of gladness above thy 
fellows;" in Heb. i. 9, "Thy God hath christed 
thee with the oil of gladness." And so (as one of 
our Reformed Catechisms, the Heidelberg, has it, 
in answer to the question, Why art thou called a 
Christian?) we are called Christians, because we 
are fellow-partakers with Him of His christing, 
His anointing. This is the anointing of which 



THE UNCTION FROM THE HOLY ONE. 311 

John speaks, the chrisma or christing of the Holy 
One. The Holy Spirit is the holy anointing 
which every believer receives : what God did to 
His Son to make Him the Christ, He does to me 
to make me a Christian. " Ye have the anointing 
ofthe Holy One." 

1. Ye have an anointing from the Holy One, It 
is as the Holy One that the Father gives the 
anointing : that wherewith He anoints is called 
the oil of holiness, the Holy Spirit. Holiness is 
indeed a Divine ointment. Just as there is noth- 
ing so subtle and penetrating as the odor with 
which the ointment fills a house, so holiness is an 
indescribable, all-pervading breath of heavenliness 
which pervades the man on whom the anointing 
rests. Holiness does not consist in certain actions : 
this is righteousness. Holiness is the unseen and 
yet manifest presence of the Holy One resting on 
His anointed. Direct from the Holy One, the 
anointing is alone received, or rather, only in the 
abiding fellowship with Him in Christ, who is 
the Holy One of God. 

And who receives it? Only he who has given 
himself entirely to be holy as God is holy. It 
was the priest, who was separated to be holy to 
the Lord, who received the anointing : upon other 
men's flesh it was not to be poured. How many 
would fain have the precious ointment for the 



312 HOLY IN CHBIST, 

sake of its perfume to themselves ! No, only he 
who is wholly consecrated to the service of the 
Holy One, to the work of the sanctuary, may re- 
ceive it. If any one had said: I would fain have 
the anointing, but not be made a priest; I am 
not ready to go and always be at the call of sinners 
seeking their God, he could have no share in it. 
Holiness is the energy that only lives to make 
holy, and to bless in so doing : the anointing of 
the Holy One is for the priest, the servant of God 
Most High. It is only in the intensity of a soul 
truly roused and given up to God's glory, God's 
kingdom, God's work, that holiness becomes a 
reality. The holy garments were only prepared 
for priests and their service. In all our seekings 
after holiness, let us remember this. As we be- 
ware of the error of thinking that work for Christ 
will make holy, let us also watch against the 
other, the straining after holiness without work. 
It is the priest who is set apart for the service of 
the holy place and the Holy One, it is the believer 
who is ready to live and die that the Holiness of 
God may triumph among men around him, who 
will receive the anointing. 

2. ''The anointing teacheth you.'^ The new man is 
created in knowledge^ as well as in righteousness 
and holiness. Christ is made to m^ wisdom^ as well 
as righteousness and sanctification. God's service 



THE UNCTION FROM THE HOLY ONE. 313 

and our lioliness are above all to be a free and full, 
an intelligent and most willing, approval of His 
blessed will. And so the anointing, to fit us for 
the service of the sanctuary, teaches us to know 
all things. Just as the perfume of the ointment 
is the most subtle essence, something that has 
never yet been found or felt, except as it is smelt, 
so the spiritual faculty which the anointing gives 
is the most subtle there can be. It makes '' quick 
of scent in the fear of the Lord : " it teaches us by 
a Divine instinct, by which the anointed one 
recognizes what has the heavenly fragrance in it, 
and what is of earth. It is the anointing that 
makes the Word and the name of Jesus in the 
Word to be indeed as ointment poured forth. 

The great mark of the anointing is thus, teach- 
ableness. It is the great mark of Christ, the Holy 
One of God, the Anointed One, that He listens : 
"I speak not of myself; as I hear, so I speak." 
And so it is of the Holy Spirit too : " He shall 
not speak out of Himself: whatsoever He shall 
hear, that shall He speak." It cannot be other- 
wise: one anointed with the anointing of this 
Christ, with this Holy Spirit, will be teachable, 
will listen to be taught. " The anointing teacheth." 
"And ye need not that any one teach you : but 
the anointing teacheth you concerning all things." 
" They shall be all taught of God," includes every 



314 HOLY IN CHRIST. 

believer. The secret of true holiness is a very 
direct and personal relation to the Holy One : all 
the teaching through the word or men made en- 
tirely dependent on and subordinate to the per- 
sonal teaching of the Holy Ghost. The teaching 
f comes through the anointing. Not, in the first 
place, in the thoughts or feelings, but in that all- 
pervading fragrance which comes from the fresh 
oil having penetrated the whole inner man. 

3. "'And the anointing abideth in you,^^ "In you,^'' 
In the spiritual life it is of deep importance ever 
to maintain the harmony between the objective 
and the subjective : God in Christ above me, God in 
the Spirit within me. In us, not as in a locality, 
but in us, as one with us, entering into the most 
secret part of our being, and pervading all, dwell- 
ing in our very body, the anointing abideth in us, 
forming part of our very selves. And this just in 
proportion as we know it and yield ourselves to it, 
as we wait and are still to let the secret fragrance 
permeate our whole being. And this, again, not 
interruptedly, but as a continuous and unvarying 
experience. Above circumstances and feelings, 
" the anointing abideth." Not, indeed, as a fixed 
state or as something in our own possession ; but, ' 
according to the law of the new life, in the de- 
pendence of faith on the Holy One, and in the fel- 
lowship of Jesus. " I am anointed with fresh 



THE UNCTION FROM THE HOLY ONE. 315 

oil," — this is the objective side ; every new morn- 
ing the believer waits for the renewal of the Divine 
gift from the Father. *' The anointing abideth in 
you," — this is the subjective side; the holy life, 
the life of faith and fellowship, the anointing, is 
always, from moment to moment, a spiritual 
reality. The holy anointing oil, always fresh, the 
anointing abiding always, is the secret of holiness. 
4. ^'And even as it taught you, ye abide in Him. " 
Here we have again the Holy Trinity : the Holy 
One, from whom the holy anointing comes ; the 
Holy Spirit, who is Himself the anointing; and 
Christ, the Holy One of God, in whom the anoint- 
ing teaches us to abide. In Christ the unseen 
holiness of God was set before us, and brought 
nigh : it became human, vested in a human nature, 
that it might be communicated to us. Within us 
dwells and works the Holy Spirit, drawing us out 
to the Christ of God, uniting us in heart and will 
to Him, revealing Him, forming Him within us, so 
that His likeness and mind are embodied in us. 
It is thus we abide in Christ : the holy anointing 
of the Holy one teacheth it to us. It is this that 
is the test of the true anointing : abiding in Christy 
as He meant it, becomes truth in us. Here is the 
life of holiness as the Thrice Holy gives it : the 
Father, the first, the Holy One, making holy ; the 
Son, the second, His Holy One, in whom we are ; 



316 HOLT IN CUBIST. 

the Spirit, the third, who dwells in us, and through 
whom we abide in Christ, and Christ in us. Thus 
it is that the Thrice Holy makes us holy. 

Let us study the Divine anointing. It comes 
from the Holy One. There is no other like it. It 
is God's way of making us holy — His holy priests. 
It is God's way of making us partakers of holiness 
in Christ. The anointing, received of Him day by 
day, abiding in us, teaching us all things, especially 
teaching us to abide in Christ, must be on us 
ever}^ day. Its subtle, all-pervading power must 
go through our whole life; the odor of the oint- 
ment must fill the house. Blessed be God, it can 
do so! The anointing that abideth makes the 
abiding in Christ a reality and a certainty ; and 
God Himself, the Holy One, makes the abiding 
anointing a reality and a certainty too. To His 
Holy Name be the praise ! 

Be holy, for I am holy. 



O Thou, who art the Holy One, I come to Thee 
now for the renewed anointing. Father ! this is 
the one gift Thy child may most surely count on 
— the gift of Thy Holy Spirit. Grant me now to 
sing, " Thou anointest my head ; " " I am anointed 
with fresh oil." 



THE UNCTION FROM THE HOLT ONE. 317 

I desire to confess with deep shame that Thy 
Spirit has been sorely grieved and dishonored. 
How often the fleshly mind has usurped His 
place in Thy worship ! How much the fleshy will 
has sought to do His work ! my Father ! let 
Thy light shine through me to convince me very 
deeply of this. Let Thy judgment come on all 
that there is of human willing and running. 

Blessed Father! grant me, according to the 
riches of Thy glory, even now to be strengthened 
with might by Thy Spirit in the inner man. 
Strengthen my faith to believe in Christ for a full 
share in His anointing. Oh, teach me day by day 
to wait for and receive the anointing with fresh 
oil! 

O my Father ! draw me and all Thy children 
to see that for the abiding in Christ we need the 
abiding anointing. Father ! we would walk 
humbly, in the dependence of faith, counting upon 
the inner and ever-abiding anointing. May we sa 
be a sweet savor of Christ to all. Amen. 



1. I think I know now the reason why at times we fail in the 
abiding. We think and read, we listen and pray, we try to 
believe and strive to look to Jesus only, and yet we fail. 
What was wanting was this : " His anointing teacheth you ; 
even as it taught you, ye abide in him ; " so far, and no 
farther. 

2. The washing always precedes the anointing : we cannot 



318 HOLY m CHBIST. 

have the anointing if we fail in the cleansing. When cleansed 
and anointed we are fit for use. 

3. Would you have the abiding anointing? Yield yourself 
wholly to be sanctified and made meet for the Master's use : 
dwell in the Holiest of all, in God's presence: accept every 
chastisement as a fellowship in the way of the rent flesh : be 
sure the anointing will flow in union with Jesus. ** It is like 
the precious ointment upon the head of Aaron, that went down 
to the skirts of his garments." 

4. The anointing is the Divine eye-salve, opening the eyes of 
the heart to know Jesus. So it teaches to abide in him. I am 
sure most Christians have no conception of the danger and de- 
ceitfulness of a thought religion, with sweet and precious 
thoughts coming to us in books and preaching, and little power. 
The teaching of the Holy Spirit is in the heart first; man's 
teaching in the mind. Let all our thinking ever lead us to 
cease from thought, and to open the heart and will to the Spirit 
to teach there in His own Divine way, deeper than thought 
and feeling. Unseen, within the veil, the Holy Spirit abideth, 
Be silent and still, believe and expect, and cling to Jesus. 

5. Oh that God would visit His Church, and teach His chil- 
dren what it is to wait for, and receive, and walk in the full 
anointing, the anointing that abideth and teacheth to abide ! 
Oh that the truth of the personal leading of the Holy Spirit in 
every believer were restored in the Church ! He is doing it; 
He will do it. 



HOLINESS AND HEAVEN 319 



THIRTY-FIRST DAY. 

HOLY IN CHRIST. 
IboUneee an& 1beaven» 

'* Seeing that all these things shall be dissolved, what manner 
of men ought ye to be in all holy living and godliness ? '' — 
2 Pet, iii. 11. 

" Follow after the sanctification without which no man shall 
see the Lord." — Heh. xii. 14. 

** He that is holy^ let him be made holy still. . . . The grace 
of the Lord Jesus be with the holy ones, Amen.'^ — Rev. xxii. 
11, 21. 

OMY brother, we are on our way to see God. 
We have been invited to meet the Holy One 
face ^o face. The infinite mystery of holiness, the 
glory of the Invisible God, before which the sera- 
phim veil their faces, is to be unveiled, to be 
revealed to us. And that not as a thing we are 
to look upon and to study. But we are to see the 
Thrice Holy One, the Living God Himself God, 
the Holy One, will show Himself to us : we are 



320 HOLY m CHRIST. 

to see God. Oh, the infinite grace, the inconceiv- 
able blessedness ! we are to see God. 

We are to see God, the Holy One. And all our 
schooling here in the life of holiness is simply the 
preparation for that meeting and that vision. 
"Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see 
God." "Follow after the sanctification, without 
which no man shall see the Lord." Since the 
time when God said to Israel, " Be ye holy, as I 
am holy," Holiness was revealed as the only 
meeting-place between God and His people. To 
be holy was to be the common ground on which 
they were to stand with Him , the one attribute 
in which they were to be like God ; the one thing 
that was to prepare them for the glorious time 
when He would no longer need to keep them 
away, but would admit them to the full fellowship 
of His glory, to have the word fulfilled in them : 
" He that is holy, let him be made yet more 
holy." 

In his second epistle, Peter reminds believers 
that the coming of the day of the Lord is \o be 
preceded and accompanied by the most tremen- 
dous catastrophe — the dissolution of the heavens 
and the earth. He makes it a plea with them to 
give diligence that they may be found without 
spot and blameless in His sight. And He asks 
them to think and say, under the deep sense of 



H0LINE8S AND HEAVEN. 321 

what the coming of the day of God would be and 
would bring, what the life of those ought to be 
who look for such things : " What manner of per- 
sons ought ye to be in all holy living and godli- 
ness?" Holiness must be its one, its universal 
characteristic. At the close of our meditations 
on God's call to Holiness, we may take Peter's 
question, and in the light of all that God has 
revealed of His Holiness, and all that waits still 
to be revealed, ask ourselves, " What manner of 
men ought we to be in all holy living and godli- 
ness?" 

Note first the meaning of the question. In the 
original Greek the words living and godliness are 
plural. Alford says, ^' In holy behaviors and 'pieties; 
the plurals mark the holy behavior and piety in 
all its forms and examples^ Peter would plead for 
a life of holiness pervading the whole man : our 
behaviors towards men, and our pieties towards 
God. True holiness cannot be found in anything 
less. Holiness must be the one, the universal 
characteristic of our Christian life. In God we 
have seen that holiness is the central attribute, 
the comprehensive expression for Divine perfec- 
tion, the attribute of all the attributes, the all- 
including epithet by which He Himself, as 
Redeemer and Father, His Son and His Spirit, 
His Day, His House, His Law, His Servants, His 
21 



322 HOLT IN CHRIST. 

People, His Name, are marked and known. 
Always and in everything, in Judgment as in 
Mercy, in His Exaltation and His Condescension, 
in His Hiddenness and His Revelation, always 
and in everything, God is the Holy One. And 
the Word would teach us that the reign of Holi- 
ness, to be true and pleasing to God, must be 
supreme, must be in all holy living and godliness. 
There must not be a moment of the day, nor a 
relation in life ; there must be nothing in the 
outer conduct, nor in the inmost recesses of the 
heart; there must be nothing belonging to us, 
whether in worship or in business, that is not 
holy. The Holiness of Jesus, the Holiness which 
comes to the Spirit's anointing, must cover and 
pervade all. Nothing, nothing may be excluded, 
if we are to be holy ; it must be as Peter said 
when he spoke of God's call — holy in all manner 
of living ; it must be as he says here — " in all 
holy living and godliness." To use the significant 
language of the Holy Spirit : Everything must be 
done, " worthily of the holy ones," *' as becometh 
holy ones." Rom. xvi. 3 ; Ejph. v. 3. 

Note, too, the force of the question. Peter 
says, " Wherefore, beloved, seeing that ye look for 
these things." Yes, let us think what that means. 
We have been studying, down through the course 
of Revelation, the wondrous grace and patience 



HOLINESS AND HEAVEN. 32S 

with which God has made known and made par- 
taker of His holiness, in all preparation for what 
is to come. We have heard God, the Holy One, 
calling us, pleading with us, commanding us to be 
holy, as He is holy. And we expect to meet 
Him, and to dwell through eternity in His Light, 
holy as He is holy. It is not a dream ; it is a 
living reality ; we are looking forward to it, as the 
only one thing that makes life worth living. We 
are looking forward to Love to welcome us, as 
with the confidence of childlike love we come as 
His Holy ones to cry. Holy Father! 

We have learnt to know Jesus, the Holy One 
of God, our Sanctification. AVe are living in 
Him, day by day, as those who are holy in Christ 
Jesus. We are drawing on His Holiness without 
ceasing. We are walking in that will of God 
which He did, and which He enables us to do. 
And we are looking forward to meet Him with 
great joy, " when He shall come to be glorified in 
the holy ones, and to be admired in all them that 
believe." We have within us the Holy Spirit,'the 
Holiness of God in Christ come down to be at 
home within us, as the earnest of our inheritance. 
He, the Spirit of Holiness, is secretly transform- 
ing us within, sanctifying our spirit, soul, and 
body, to be blameless at His coming, and making 
us meet for the inheritance of the holy ones in 



324 HOLY IN CHRIST. 

light. We are looking forward to the time when 
He shall have completed His work, when the 
body of Christ shall be perfected, and the bride, 
all filled and streaming with the life and glory of 
the Spirit within her, shall be set with Him on 
His throne, even as He sat with the Father on 
His throne. We hope through eternity to wor- 
ship and adore the mystery of the Thrice Holy 
One. Even here it fills our souls with trembling 
joy and wonder: when God's work of making 
holy is complete, how we shall join in the song, 
*^Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty, which 
wast, and art, and art to come ! " 

In preparation for all this the most wonderful 
events are to take place. The Lord Jesus Him- 
self is to appear, the power of sin and the world 
is to be destroyed ; this visible system of things 
is to be broken up ; the power of the Spirit is to 
triumph through all creation ; there is to be a 
new heaven and a new earth, wherein dwelleth 
righteousness. And holiness is then to be un- 
folded in ever-growing blessedness and glory in 
the fellowship of the Thrice Holy : *' He that is 
hoh\ let him be holy yet more." Surely it but 
needs the question to be put for each believer to 
feel and acknowledge its force : " Wherefore, 
beloved, seeing that ye look for these things, what 



HOLmESS AND HEAVEK 325 

manner of men ought ye to be in all holy living 
and godliness ? " 

And note now the need and the point of the 
question. " What manner of persons ought ye to 
be ? " But is such a question needed ? Can it be 
that God's holy ones, made holy in Christ Jesus, 
with the very spirit of holiness dwelling with 
them, on the way to meet the Holy One in His 
Glory and Love, can it be that they need the 
question ? Alas ! alas ! it was so in the time of 
Peter; it is but too much so in our days too. 
Alas! how many Christians there are to whom 
the very word Holy, though it be the name by 
which the Father, in His New Testament, loves to 
call His children more than any other, is strange 
and unintelligible. And again, alas ! for how 
many Christians there are for whom, when the 
word is heard, it has but little attraction, because 
it has never yet been shown to them as a life that 
is indeed possible, and unutterably blessed. And 
yet again, alas ! for how many are there not, even 
workers in the Master's service, to whom the " all 
holy living and godliness " is yet a secret and a 
burden, because they have not yet consented to 
give up all, both their will and their work, for the 
Holy One to take and fill with His Holy Spirit. 
And yet once more, alas ! as the cry comes, even 
from those who do know the power of a holy 



826 HOLT m CHBI8T. 

life, lamenting their unfaithfulness and unbelief, 
as they see how much richer their entrance into 
the Holy Life might have been, and how much 
fuller the blessing they still feel so feeble to com- 
municate to others. Oh, the question is needed ! 
Shall not each of us take it, and keep it, and 
answer it by the Holy Spirit through whom it 
came, and then pass it on to our brethren, that 
we and they may help each other in faith, and 
live in joy and hope to give the answer our God 
would have ? 

" Seeing that these things are, then, all to be dis- 
solved, what manner of persons ought we to be in 
all holy living and godliness ? " Brethren ! the 
time is short. The world is passing away. The 
heathen are perishing. Christians are sleeping. 
Satan is active and mighty. God's holy ones are 
the hope of the Church and the world. It is they 
their Lord can use. " What manner of persons 
shall we be in all holy living and godliness ! *' 
Shall we not seek to be such as the Father com- 
mands, " Holy, as He is holy " ? Shall we not 
yield ourselves afresh and undividedly to Him who 
is our Sanctification, and to His Blessed Spirit, to 
make us holy in all behaviors and pieties ? Oh ! 
shall we not, in thought of the love of our Lord 
Jesus, in thought of the coming glory, in view of 
the coming end, of the need of the Church and 



HOLINESS AND HEAVEN. 327 

the world, give ourselves to be holy as He is holy, 
that we may have power to bless each believer we 
meet with the message of what God will do, and 
that in concert with them we 'may be a light and 
a blessing to this perishing world ? 

I close with the closing words of God's Blessed 
Book, '^ He which testifieth these things saith, Yea, 
I come quickly. Amen : Come, Lord Jesus. The 
grace of the Lord Jesus be with the holy ones. 
Amen." 

Be ye holy, as I am holy. 



Most Holy God ! who hast called us to be holy, 
we have heard Thy voice asking, What manner of 
persons we ought to be in all holy living and god- 
liness ? With our whole soul we answer in deep 
contrition and humility : Holy Father ! we ought 
to be so different from what we have been. In 
faith and love, in zeal and devotion, in Christlike 
humility and holiness, Father! we have not 
been, before Thee and the world, what we ought 
to be, what we could be. Holy Father! we now 
pray for all who unite with us in this prayer, and 
implore of Thee to grant a great revival of True 
Holiness in us and in all Thy Church. Visit, we 
beseech Thee, visit all ministers of Thy word, that 



328 HOLY m CHEI8T, 

in view of Thy coming they may take up and 
sound abroad the question, What manner of per- 
sons ought ye to be? Lay upon them, and ali 
Thy people, such a burden under surrounding un- 
hohness and worldliness, that they may not cease 
to cry to Thee. Grant them such a vision of the 
highway of holiness, the new and living way in 
Christ, that they may preach Christ our Sanctifi- 
cation in the power and the joy of the Holy Ghost, 
with the confident and triumphant voice of wit- 
nesses who rejoice in what Thou dost for them. 
O God ! roll away the reproach of Thy people, 
that their profession does not make them humbler 
or holier, more loving, and more heavenly than 
others. 

O Holy God ! give Thou Thyself the answer to 
Thy question, and teach us and the world what 
manner of persons Thy people can be, in the day 
of Thy power, in the beauty of holiness. We bow 
our knee to Thee, O Father, that Thou wouldst 
grant us, according to the riches of Thy glory, to 
be mightily strengthened in the inner man by the 
Spirit of Holiness. Amen. 

1. What manner of men ought ye to be in all the holy liv- 
ing ? This is a question God has written down for us. Might 
it not help us if we were to write down the answer and say 
how holy we think we ought to be ? The clearer and more 
distinct our views are of what God wishes, of what He has 



HOLINESS AND HEAVEN. 329 

made possible, of what in reality ought to be, the more definite 
our acts of confession, of surrender, and of faith can become. 

2. Let every believer, who longs to be holy, join in the daily 
prayer that God would visit His people with a great outpouring 
of the Spirit of Holiness. Pray without ceasing that every be- 
liever may live as a holy one. 

3. " Seeing that ye look for these things." Our life depends, 
in more than one sense, upon what we look at. " We look not 
at the things which are seen." It is only as we look at the in- 
visible and Spiritual, and come under its power, that we shall 
be what we ought to be in all holy living and godliness. 

4. Holy in Christ, Let this be our parting word. However 
strong the branch becomes, however far away it reaches round 
the home, out of sight of the vine, all its beauty and all its 
fruitfulness ever depend upon that one point of contact where 
it grows out of the vine. So be it with us too. All the outer 
circumference of my life has its centre in the ego — the living, 
conscious I myself, in which my being roots. And this I is rooted 
in Christ. Down in the depths of my inner life, there is Christ 
holding, bearing, guiding, quickening me into holiness and 
fruitfulness. In Him I am, in Him I will abide. His will and 
commands will I keep ; His Love and Power will I trust. And 
I will daily seek to praise God that I am Holy in Christ. 



NOTES. 331 



NOTKS. 



NOTE A. 

Holiness As Proprietorship. 

In a little book — Holiness^ as understood by tlie 
Writers of the Bible; A Bible Study by Joseph Agar 
Beet — the thought that by Holiness is meant our rela- 
tion to God, and the claim He has upon us, has been 
very carefully worked out. Holy ground was such 
because *' it stood in special relation to Himself." The 
first-born '* were to stand in a special relation to God 
as His property ,^^ So with the entire nation; when 
God declares that they shall be holy, He means '*that 
they shall render to Him the devotion He requires." 
"All holy objects stand in a special relation to God as 
His property." The priests are said to sanctify them- 
selves ; they did this '* by formally placing themselves 
at God's disposal, or by separating themselves from 
whatever was inconsistent with the service of God." 
'^When God declares He is Holy, the word must 
represent the same idea in the hundreds of passages 
in which it is predicated of men and things." " Holi- 
ness is God's claim to the ownership of men and things ; 
and the objects claimed were called holy. Now, 



332 NOTES, 

God^s claim was a new and wondrous revelation of 
His nature. To Aaron God was now the Great Being 
who had claimed from him a lifelong and exclusive 
service. This claim was a new era, not only in his 
everyday life, but in his conception of God. Con- 
sequently the word holy, which expressed Aaron^s 
relation to God, was suitably used to express God's 
relation to Aaron. In other words, to Aaron and 
Israel God was holy in the sense that He claimed the 
exclusive ownership of the entire nation. When men 
yielded to God the devotion He claimed, they were 
said to sanctify God." "Jehovah and'Israel stood in 
special relation to each other ; therefore Jehovah was 
the Holy One of Israel, and Israel was Holy to Jehovah. 
This mutual relation rested upon God's claim that 
Israel should specially be His ; and this claim implied 
that in a special manner He would belong to Israel. 
This claim was a manifestation of the nature of God.'' 
"The peculiar relation arises from God's own claim, 
in consequence of which they stand in a new and 
solemn relation to Him. This may be called objective 
holiness. This is the most common sense of the 
word. In this sense God sanctified these objects for 
Himself. But since some of these objects were intel- 
ligent beings, and the others were in control of such, 
the word sanctify denotes these ones' formal surrender 
of themselves and their possessions to God. This 
may be called subjective holiness. From the word 
holy predicated of God, we learn that God's claim 
was not merely occasional, but an outflow of His 
Essence. As the one Being who claims unlimited and 
absolute ownership and supreme devotion, God is the 
Holy One." 

In the New Testament the Spirit of God claims the 
epithet holy "as being in a very special manner the 
source and influence of which God is the one and only 



NOTES, S33 

aim." Here "our conception of the holiness of God 
increases with our increasing perception of the great- 
ness of His claim upon us, and that this claim springs 
from the very essence of God. In the incarnate Son 
of God we see the full development and realization of 
the Biblical idea of holiness. We find Him standing 
in a special relation to God, and living a life of which 
the one and only aim is to advance the purposes of 
God. ' ' We see in Him ' ' Holiness in its highest degree, 
i.e. the highest conceivable devotion to God and to 
the advancement of His kingdom.'^ "In virtue of 
His intelligent, hearty, continued appropriation of 
the Father^ s purpose, and in virtue of its realization 
in all the details of the Saviour's life, He was called 
the Holy One of God.'' 

''The word saint is very appropriate as a designa- 
tion of the followers of Christ ; for it declares what 
God requires them to be. By calling His people 
saints, God declares His will that we live a life of 
which He is the one and only aim. This is the objec- 
tive holiness of the Church of Christ. In some pas- 
sages holiness is set before the people* of God as a 
standard for their attainment. In these passages holy 
denotes a realization in man of God's purpose that he 
live a life of which God is the one and only aim. 
This is the subjective holiness of God's people. 

"Holiness is God's claim that His creatures use all 
their powers and opportunities to work out His pur- 
poses. Holiness, thus understood, is an attribute of 
God. For His claim springs from His nature, even 
from that love which is the very essence of God. His 
love to us moves Him to claim our devotion ; for only 
by absolute devotion to Him can we attain our highest 
happiness." 

"Though without purity we cannot be subjectively 
holy, yet holiness is much more than purity. Purity 



334 N0TE8. 

is a mere negative excellence; holiness implies the 
most intense mental and bodily activity of which we 
are capable. For it is the employment of all our 
powers and opportunities to advance God's purposes." 

The question, '* How we become holy/' is answered 
thus: ''Our devotion to God is a result of inward 
spiritual contact with Him who once lived a human 
life on each, and now lives a glorified human life on 
the throne, simply and only to work out the Father's 
purposes. We live for God because Christ does so, 
and because Christ lives in us, and we in Him : the 
Spirit of Christ is the Agent of the spiritual contact 
with Christ which imparts to us His life, and repro- 
duces in us His life. He is the bearer of the power 
as well as of the holiness of Christ." 

" That God claims from His people unreserved devo- 
tion to Himself, and that what He claims He works in 
all who believe it, by His own power operating through 
the inward presence of the Holy Spirit, placing us in 
spiritual contact with Christ, is the great doctrine of 
sanctification by faith." 

The same view, that holiness is a relation, had 
previously been worked out very elaborately by 
Diestel. In what has been said on redemption and 
proprietorship as related to holiness (see ' ' Sixth Day' ' ) , 
we have seen what truth there is in the thought. But 
holiness is something more. What is holy is not only 
God-devoted, but God-accepted, God-appropriated, 
God-possessed. God not only possesses the heart, but 
absolutely occupies and fills it with His life. It is this 
makes it holy. 

However much truth there be in the above exposi- 
tion, it hardly meets our desire for an insight into 
what is one of the highest attributes of the very 
Being of God. When the seraphs worship Him as the 
Holy One, and in their Thrice Holy reflect something 



NOTES. 335 

of the deepest mystery of Godhead, it surely means 
more than merely the expression of God's claim as 
Sovereign Proprietor of all. 

The mistake appears to originate in taking first the 
meaning of the word holy from earthly objects, and 
then irom that deducing that holiness in God cannot 
mean more than it does when applied to men. The 
Scriptures point to the opposite way. When Old and 
New Testaments say, " Be ye holy, for I am holy, I make 
holy," they point to God's Holiness as the first, both 
the reason and the source of ours. We ought first to 
discover what holiness in God is. When we read at 
creation of God's sanctifying the Sabbath day, we 
have to do not with a thought or word of Moses as to 
what God had done, but with a Divine revelation of a 
Power in God greater and more wonderful than crea- 
tion, the Power which is later on revealed as the 
deepest mystery of the Divine Being. 

This Holiness in God, as it appears to me, cannot be a 
mere relation. To indicate a relation, tells me noth- 
ing positively about the personal character or worth 
of the related parties. To say that when God sancti- 
fies men He claims them as His own, does not say 
what the nature is of the work He does for them and 
in them, or what the Power by which He does it. 
And yet that word ought to reveal to me what it is 
that God bestows. To say that that claim has its root 
in His very nature, and in His love, and that holiness 
is therefore an attribute, makes it an attribute, not 
like love or wisdom, immanent in the Divine Being, 
ere creatures were, but simply an effect of Love, 
moving God to claim His creatures as His special pos- 
session. We should then have no attribute expres- 
sive of God's moral perfection. Nor would the word 
holy of the Son and the Spirit any longer indicate 
that deep and mysterious communication of the very 



336 NOTES. 

nature and life of God in which sanctification has its 
glory. In the Divine holiness we have the highest 
and inconceivably glorious revelation of the very 
essence of the Divine Being ; in the holiness of the 
saints the deepest revelation of the change by which 
their inmost nature is renewed into the likeness of 
God. 



NOTE B. 

On the Word for Holiness. 

The proper meaning of the Hebrew word for holy, 
kadoshj is matter of uncertainty. It may come from 
a root signifying to shine. (So Gesenius, Oehler, 
Fiirst, and formerly Delitzsch, on Heb. ii. 11.) Or 
from another denoting new and bright (Diestel) , or 
an Arabic form meaning to cut, to separate. (So 
Delitzsch now, on Ps. xxii 4.) Whatever the root be, 
the chief idea appears to be not only separate or set 
apart, for which the Hebrew has entirely different 
words, but that by which a thing that is separated from 
others for its worth is distinguished above them. It 
indicates not only separation as an act or fact, but the 
superiority or excellence in virtue of which, either as 
already possessed or sought after, the separation 
takes place. 

In his Lexicon of New Testament Greek, Cremer has 
an exhaustive article on the Greek hagios, pointing 
out how holiness is an entirely Biblical idea, and " how 
the scriptural conceptions of God's Holiness, notwith- 
standing the original aflanity, is diametrically opposite 
to all the Greek notions; and how, whereas these 
very views of holiness exclude from the gods all pos- 
sibility of love, the scriptural conception of hohness 



NOTES. 337 

unfolds itself only when in closest connection with 
Divine love." It is a most suggestive thought that 
we owe both the word and the thought distinctly to 
revelation. Every other attribute of God has some 
notion to correspond with it in the human mind : the 
thought of holiness is distinctly Divine. Is not this 
the reason that, though God has so distinctly in the* 
New Testament called His people holy ones, the word 
holy has so little entered into the daily language and 
life of the Christian Church? 



NOTE C. 

The Holiness of God. 

There is not a word so exclusively scriptural, so dis- 
tinctly Divine, as the word holy in its revelation and 
its meaning. As a consequence of this its Divine 
origin, it is a word of inexhaustible significance. 
There is not one of the attributes of God which 
theologians have found it so dif&cult to define, or 
concerning which they differ so much. A short 
survey of the various views that have been taken 
may teach us how little the idea of the Divine Holi- 
ness can be comprehended or exhausted by human 
definition, and how it is only in the life of fellowship 
and adoration that the holiness which passes all 
understanding can, as a truth and a reality, be appre- 
hended. 

1. The most external view, in which the ethical 
was very much lost sight of, is that in which holiness 
is identified with God's Separateness from the creation, 
and elevation above it. Holiness was defined as the 
incomparable Glory of God, His exclusive adorable- 
22 



338 NOTES. 

ness, His infinite Majesty. Sufficient attention was 
not paid to the fact that though all these thoughts are 
closely connected with God's Holiness, they are but a 
formal definition of the results and surroundings of 
the Holiness, but do not lead us to the apprehension 
of that wherein its real essence consists. 

2. Another view, which also commences from the 
external, and makes that the basis of its interpreta- 
tion, regards holiness simply as the expression of a 
relation. Because what was set apart for God's ser- 
vice was called holy, the idea of separation, of con- 
secration, of ownership, is taken as the starting-point 
And so, because we are said to be holy, as belonging 
to God, God is holy as claiming us and belonging to 
us too. Instead of regarding holiness as a positive 
reality in the Divine nature, from which our holiness 
is to be derived, our holiness is made the starting- 
point for expounding the Holiness of God. ''God is 
holy as being, within the covenant, not only the 
Proprietor, but the Property of His people, their 
highest good and their only rule'' (Diestel). Of this 
view mention has already been made in the note to 
"Sixth Day," on Holiness as Proprietorship. 

3. Passing over to the views of those who regard 
holiness as being a moral attribute, the most common 
one is that of purity, freedom from sin. ''Holiness is 
a general term for the moral excellence of God. 
There is none holy as the Lord : no other being abso- 
lutely pure and free from all limitations in His moral 
perfection. Holiness, on the one hand, implies entire 
freedom from moral evil ; and, upon the other, 
absolute moral perfection." (Hodge, Syst. TheoL) 
The idea of holiness as the infinite Purity which is 
free from all sin, which hates and punishes it, is 
what in thfe popular conception is the most prominent 
idea. The negative stands more in the foreground 



NOTES. 339 

than the positive. The view has its truth and its 
value from the fact that in our sinful state the first 
impression the Holiness of God must make is that of 
fear and dread in the consciousness of our sinfulness 
and unholiness. But it does not tell us wherein this 
moral excellence or perfection of God really consists. 

4. It is an advance on this view when the attempt is 
made to define what this perfection of God is. A 
thing is perfect when it is in everything as it ought to 
be. It is easy thus to define perfection, but not so 
easy to define what the perfection of any special 
object is : this needs the knowledge of what its nature 
is. And we have to rest content with very general 
terms defining God's Holiness as the essential and 
absolute good. *' Holiness is the free, deliberate, 
calm, and immutable afiirmation of Himself, who is 
goodness, or of goodness, which is Himself (Godet 
on John xvii. ll) . * ^ Holiness is that attribute in virtue 
of which Jehovah makes Himself the absolute 
standard of Himself, of His being and revelation." 
(Kubel.) 

5. Closely allied to this is the view that holiness is 
not so much an attribute, but the *' whole complex of 
that which we are wont to look at and represent 
singly in the individual attributes of God.'' So. 
Bengel looked upon holiness as the Divine nature, in 
which all the attributes are contained. In the same 
spirit what Howe says of holiness as the Divine 
beauty, the result of the perfect harmony of all the 
attributes, *' Holiness is intellectual beauty. Divine 
holiness is the most perfect beauty, and the measure 
of all other. The Divine Holiness is the most perfect 
pulchritude, the ineffable and immortal pulchritude, 
that cannot be declared by words, or seen by eyes. 
This may therefore be called a transcendental attri- 
bute that, as it were, runs through the rest, and casts 



340 NOTES. 

a glory upon every one. It is an attribute of attri- 
butes. These are fit predications, holy power, holy 
love. And so it is the very lustre and glory of His 
other perfections. He is glorious in holiness. '^ (Howe 
in Whyte^s Shorter Catechism.) This was the aspect of 
the Divine Holiness on which Jonathan Edwards 
delighted to dwell. " The mutual love of the Father 
and the Son makes the third, the personal Holy Spirit, 
or the Holiness of God, which is His infinite beauty.'' 
^'By the communication of God's Holiness the crea- 
ture partakes of God's moral excellence, which is per- 
fection, the beauty of the Divine nature." *' Holiness 
comprehends all the true moral excellence of intel- 
ligent beings. So the Holiness of God is the same 
with the moral excellency of the Divine nature, com- 
prehending all His perfections. His righteousness, 
faithfulness, and goodness. There are two kinds of 
attributes in God, according to our way of conceiving 
Him : His moral attributes, which are summed up in 
His Holiness, and His natural, as strength, knowledge, 
etc., which constitute His greatness. Holy persons, 
in the exercise of holy affection, love God in the first 
place for the beauty of His Holiness." ''The holiness 
of an intelligent creature is that which gives beauty 
to all his natural perfections. And so it is in God : 
lioliness is in a peculiar manner the beauty of the 
Divine being. Hence we often read of the beauty of 
lioliness. Ps. xxix. 2, xcvi. 9, ex. 3. This renders all 
the other attributes glorious and lovely." ''There- 
fore, if the true loveliness of God's perfections arise 
from the loveliness of His Holiness, the true love of 
all His perfections will arise from the love of His 
Holiness. And as the beauty of the Divine nature 
primarily consists in God's Holiness, so does the 
beauty of all Divine things." 
B, In speaking of God's Holiness as denoting the 



NOTES. 341 

essential good, the absolute excellence of His nature, 
some press very strongly the ethical aspect. The 
good in God must not be from mere natural impulse 
only, flowing from the necessity of His nature, with- 
out being freely willed by Himself "What is 
naturally good is not the true realization of the good. 
The actual and living will to be the good He is, must 
also have its place in God, otherwise God would only 
be naturally ethical. Only in the will which con- 
sciously determines itself, is there the possibility 
given of the ethical. The ethical has such a power in 
God that He is the holy Power, who cannot and will 
not renounce Himself, who must be, and would be 
thought to be, the holy necessity of the goodness 
which is Himself, — to be the Holy. The love of God 
is essentially holy ; it desires and preserves the 
ethically necessary or holy, which God is." (Dorner, 
System, vol. i.) 

7. It was felt in such views that there was not a 
sufficient acknowledgment of the truth that it is 
especially as the Holy One that God is called the 
Redeemer, and that He does the work of love to make 
holy. This led to the view that holiness and love are, 
if not identical, at least correlated expressions. 
*'God is holy, exalted above all the praise of the 
creature in His incomparable praise-worthiness, on 
account of His free and loving condescension to the 
creature, to manifest in it the glory of His love.'^ 
" God is holy, inasmuch as love in Him has restrained 
and conquered the righteous wrath (as Hosea says, 
xi. 9), and judgment is exercised only after every 
way of mercy has been tried. This holiness is dis- 
closed in the New Testament name, as exalted as it is 
condescending, of Father." (Stier on John xvii.) 

8. The large measure of truth in this view is met by 
an expression in which the true aspects of the Holi- 



342 NOTES. 

ness of God are combined. It is deJBned as being the 
harmony of self-preservation and self-communication. 
As the Holy One, God hates sin, and seeks to destroy 
it. As the Holy One, He makes the sinner holy, and 
then takes him up into His love. In maintaining His 
love, He never for a moment loses His Divine purity 
and perfection ; in maintaining His righteousness. He 
still communicates Himself to the fallen creature. 
Holiness is the Divine glory, of which love and 
righteousness are the two sides, and which in their 
work on earth they reveal. 

"Holiness is the self-preservation of God, whereby 
He keeps Himself free from the world without Him, 
and remains consistent with Himself and faithful to 
His Being, and whereby He, with this view, creates a 
Di\ane world that lives for Himself alone in the 
organization of His Church." (Lange.) 

*'The Holiness of God is God's self-preservation, or 
keeping to Himself, in virtue of which He remains 
the same in all relationships which exist within His 
Deity, or into which He enters, never sacrifices what 
is Divine, or admits what is not Divine. But this is 
only one aspect. God's Holiness would not be holi- 
ness, but exclusiveness, if it did not provide for God's 
-entering into manifold relations, and so revealing and 
communicating Himself. Holiness is therefore the 
union and interpretation of God's keeping to Himself 
and communicating Himself; of His nearness and 
His distance ; of His exclusiveness and His self-revela- 
tion : of separateness and fellowship." (Schmieder.) 

"The Divine Holiness is mainly seclusion from the 
impurity and sinfulness of the creature, or, expressed 
positively, the cleanness and purity of the Divine 
nature, which excludes all connection with the wicked. 
In harmony with this, the Divine Holiness, as an 
attribute of revelation, is not merely an abstract 



NOTES, 343 

power, but is the Divine self-representation and self- 
testimony for the purpose of giving to the world the 
participation in the Divine life." (Oehler, TheoL of 
O. T. i. 160.) 

*^ Opposition to sin is the first impression which man 
receives of God's Holiness. Exclusion, election, 
cleansing, redemption — these are the four forms in 
which God's Holiness appears in the sphere of 
humanity ; and we may say that God's Holiness signi- 
fies His opposition to sin manifesting itself in atone- 
TYient and redemption, or in judgment Or as holiness, 
so far as it is embodied in law, must be the highest 
moral perfection, we may say, * holiness is the purity 
of God manifesting itself in atonement and redemption, 
and correspondingly in judgment^ By this view all 
the above elements are done justice to ; holiness asserts 
itself in judging righteousness, and in electing, 
purifying, and redeeming love, and thus it appears as 
the impelling and formative principle of the revela- 
tion of redemption, without a knowledge of which an 
understanding of the revelation is impossible, and by 
the perception of which it is seen in its full, clear 
light. God is light : this is a full and exhaustive New 
Testament phrase for God's Holiness." 1 John i. 5. 
(Cremer.) 

This view is brought out with special distinctness in 
the writings of J. T. Beck. "It is God's Holiness 
which, taking the good which was given in creation 
in strict faithfulness to that good and perfect will of 
God, as the eternal life-purpose of love, in righteous- 
ness and mercy carried out to its completion in God 
Himself to a life of perfection. God does this as the 
Alone Holy. In the world of sin Divine love can only 
bring deliverance by a mediation in which it is recon- 
ciled to the Divine wrath within their common centre, 
the Holiness of God, in such a way that while wrath 



344 NOTES. 

manifests its destroying reality, love shall prove its 
restoring power in the life it gives." (Beck, 
Lehrwissenschaft, 168, 547.) 

' ' Holiness is the sum and substance of the Divine 
life, as, in comparison with all that is created, it 
exists as a perfect life, but as it, at the same time, 
opens itself to the creature to take it up into a God- 
like perfection — that is, to be holy as God is holy. 
Holiness is thus so far from being in opposition to the 
Divine love that it is its essential feature or norm, 
and the actual contents of love. In holiness there is 
combined the Divine self-existence as a perfection of 
life, and the Divine self- exertion in the realizing a 
Godlike perfection of life in the world. Holiness as 
an attribute of the Divine Being is His pure and 
inviolably self-contained personality in its absolute 
perfection. Hence it is that in holiness, as the absolute 
unity and purity of the Divine Being and working, 
all the attributes of Divine revelation centre. And 
so holiness, as expressive of the Being of God, quali- 
fies the love as essentially Divine. 

''Love is the groundform of the Divine will, but as 
such it receives its Divine filling and character from 
the Divine Holiness, as the Divine self-existence and 
self-exertion. As such the Divine will manifests itself 
in two modes — in its pure love as Goodness, in its holy 
harmony as Righteousness. These two do not exist 
separately, but permeate each other in reciprocal 
immanence, just as God in His Holiness is love, and in 
His love is holiness. In goodness the Divine love 
shows itself as the pleasure in well-being. But in 
this goodness the righteousness of God, to secure the 
well-doing, also acts.'' (J. T. Beck, Glaubenslehre.) 

'' God is holy, separate from all darkness and sin, 
but not in isolated majesty banishing the imperfect 
and the sinful from His presence : for God is lights 



NOTES, 345 

God is love. It is the nature of light to communicate 
itself. Remaining pure and bright, undiminished and 
unsullied, it overcomes darkness and kindles light. 
The Holiness of God is likewise mentioned in Scrip- 
ture, mostly in connection with love, communicating 
itself and drawing into itself. 'I am holy' — but 
God does not remain alone, separate — 'be ye also 
holy.' " (Saphir on Hebrews xii.) 

'*When we think of God as light and love, we 
realize most fully the idea of holiness, combining 
separateness and purity with communion.^ ^ (Saphir, 
The Lord's Prayer, p. 128.) 

" It is especially as the spirit of His Church, and as 
dwelling in the human heart, that God is the Holy 
One." (Mtsch.) 

That in the Holiness of God we have the union of 
love and righteousness, has been perhaps put by no 
one more clearly than Godet. In his Commentary on 
Romans iii. 25, 26, he writes : — 

'' The necessity of the expiatory sacrifice arises from 
His whole Divine character ; in other words, from His 
Holiness, the principle at once of His love and right- 
eousness, and not of His righteousness exclusively." 

"In this question we have to do not with God in 
His essence, but with God in His relation to free man. 
Now the latter is not holy to begin with ; the use 
which he makes of his liberty is not yet regulated by 
love. The attribute of righteousness, and the firm 
resolution to maintain the Divine holiness, must there- 
fore appear as a necessary safeguard as soon as liberty 
comes on the stage, and with it the possibility of | 
disorder ; and this attribute must remain in exercise 
as long as the educational period of the creature lasts 
— that is to say, until he has reached perfection in 
love. Then all these factors — right, law, justice — will 
return to their latent state. . . . 



346 NOTES. 

"It is common to regard love as the fdndamental 
feature of the Divine character ; in this way it is very- 
difficult to reach the attribute of righteousness. 
Most thinkers, indeed, do not reach it at all. This 
one fact should show the error in which they are 
entangled. Holy^ holy, holy, say the creatures nearest 
to God, and not Good, good, good. Holiness, such is 
the essence of God ; and holiness is the absolute love 
of the good, the absolute horror of the evil. From 
this it is not difficult to deduce both love and right- 
eousness. Love is the goodwill of God toward all 
free beings, who are destined to realize the good. 
Love goes out to the individuals, as holiness itself to 
the good which they ought to produce. Righteous- 
ness, on the other hand, is the firm purpose of God to 
maintain the normal relations between all these crea- 
tures by His blessings and punishments. It is obvious 
that righteousness is included, no less than love itself, 
in the fundamental feature of the Divine character, 
holiness. It is no offence, therefore, by God to speak 
of His justice and His rights. It is, on the contrary, 
a glory to God, who knows that in preserving His 
place He is securing the good of others. For God, 
in maintaining His supreme dignity, preserves to His 
creatures their most precious treasure, a God worthy 
of their respect and love.'' 

And in his Defence of the Christian Faith Godet 
writes, on " The Perfect Holiness of Jesus Christ," as 
follows : — 

''The supernatural in its highest form is not the 
miraculous, it is holiness. In the miraculous we see 
Omnipotence breaking forth to act upon the material 
world in the interests of the moral order. But holi- 
ness is morality itself in its sublimest manifestation. 
What is goodness?* It has recently been said, with a 
precision which leaves nothing to be desired, Good- 



NOTES, 347 

ness is not an entity — a thing. It is a law determin- 
ing the relations between things, relations which have 
to be realized by free wills. Perfect good is therefore 
the realization, at once normal and free, of the right 
relations to one another of all beings ; each being 
occupying, by virtue of this relation, that place in the 
great whole, and playing that part in it, which befits 
it. 

*^ Now, just as in a human family there is one central 
relation on which all the rest depend, — that of the 
father to all the members of this little whole, — so is 
there in the universe one supreme position, which is 
the support of all the rest, and which, in the interest 
of all beings, must be above all others preserved 
intact — that of God. And just here, in the general 
sphere of good, is the special domain of holiness. 
Holiness in God Himself is His fixed determination to 
maintain intact the order which ought to reign among 
all beings that exist, and to bring them to realize that 
relation to each other which ought to bind them 
together in a great unity, and consequently to pre- 
serve, above all, intact and in its proper dignity. His 
own position relatively to free beings. The Holiness 
of God thus understood comprehends two things — 
the importation of all the wealth of His own Divine 
life to each free being who is willing to acknowledge 
His sovereignty, and who sincerely acquiesces in it ; 
and the withholding or the withdrawal of that perfect 
life from every being who either attacks or denies 
that sovereignty, and who seeks to shake off that 
bond of dependence by which he ought to be bound 
to God. Holiness in the creature is its own voluntary 
acquiescence in the supremacy of God. The man 
who, with all the powers of his nature, does homage 
to God as the Supreme, the absolute Being, the only 
One who veritably is ; the man who, in His presence, 



348 NOTES. 

voluntarily prostrates himself in the sense of his own 
nothingness, and seeks to draw all his fellow-creat- 
ures into the same voluntary self-annihilation, in so 
doing puts on the character of holiness. This holi- 
ness comprehends in him, as it does in God, love and 
righteousness ; love by which he rejoices in recogniz- 
ing God, and all beings who surround God, as placed 
where they are by Him. He loves them and wills their 
existence, because he loves and wills the existence of 
God, and at the same time of all that God wills and 
loves ; and righteousness, by which he respects and, 
as much as in him lies, causes others to respect God, 
and the sphere assigned by God to each being. Such 
is holiness as it exists in God and in man : in God it is 
His own inflexible self-assertion ; in man it is his 
inflexible assertion of God. 

' * It is in Jesus that human nature sees how man can 
assert God and all that God asserts, not only humbly, 
but joyously and filially, with all the powers of his 
being, and even to the complete sacrifice of himself. "^^ 

Careful reflection will show us that in each of the 
above views there is a measure of truth. It will con- 
vince us how the very difficulty of formulating to 
human thought the conception of the Divine Holiness 
proves that it is the highest expression for that inef- 
fable and inconceivable glory of the Divine Being 
which constitutes Him the Infinite and Glorious God. 
Every attribute of God — wisdom and power, righteous- 
ness and love — has its image in human nature, and 
was in the religion or the philosophy of the heathen 
connected with the idea of God. From ourselves, 
when we take away the idea of imperfection, we can 
form some conception of what God is. But holiness 
is that which is characteristically Divine, the special 
contents of a Divine revelation. Let us learn to con- 
fess that however much we may seek, now from one, 



NOTES, 349 

then from another side, to grasp the thought, the holi- 
ness of God is something that transcends all thought, 
a glory not so much to be thought, as to be known, in 
adoration and fellowship. Scripture speaks not so 
much of holiness, as the Holy One. It is as we wor- 
ship and fear, obey and love ; it is in a life with God, 
that something of the mystery of His glory will be 
unfolded. As the Divine light shines in us and 
through us, will the Holy One be revealed. 



NOTE D. 



" Our holiness does not consist in our changing and 
becoming better ourselves : it is rather JEZe, He Him- 
self, born and growing in us, in such a way as to fill 
our hearts, and to drive out our natural self, 'our old 
man,' which cannot itself improve, and whose destiny 
is only to perish. 

'' And how is this kind of incarnation effected, by 
which Christ Himself becomes our new self? By a 
process of a free and moral nature, described by 
Jesus in words which surprise, because they place 
His sanctification upon nearly the same footing as our 
own : 'As the living Father hath sent me, and I live 
by the Father, so he that eateth me shall live by me.' 

"Jesus derived the nourishment of His life from the 
Father who had sent Him : He lived by the Father. 
The meaning of that, doubtless, is, that every time 
He had to act or speak. He first effaced Himself ; then 
left it to the Father to think, to will, to act, to be 
everything in Him. Similarly, when we are called 
upon to do any act, or speak any word, we must first 
efface ourselves in presence of Jesus ; and after hav- 



350 MOTES. 

ing suppressed in ourselves, by an act of the will, 
every wish, every thought, every act of our own self, 
we are to leave it to Jesus to manifest in us His will. 
His wisdom, His power. Then it is that we live by 
Him, as He lives by the Father. The process is iden- 
tical in Jesus and in us. Only in Jesus it was carried 
on with God directly, because He was in immediate 
communion with Him ; whilst in our case the transac- 
tion is with Jesus, because it is with Him that the 
believer holds direct communication, and through 
Him that we can find and possess the living Father. 
In that lies the secret^ generally so little understood, 
of Christian sanctification,^^ (Godet, Biblical Studies, 
K r., p. 190.) 



NOTE E. 



Let me once more refer all students of holiness to 
Marshall on Sanctification, and specially his third and 
fourth chapters. If they will compare him with our 
modern works — say, for instance, God?s Way of Holi- 
ness, by so eminent an author as Dr. H. Bonar — they 
cannot but be struck by the prominence which Mar- 
shall gives to the one thought, that our holiness, a 
holy nature, is provided in Jesus, and that as faith 
accepts and maintains our union with Jesus in 
personal intercourse, sanctification is by faith. While, 
in other works, the union to Jesus, and faith in Him, 
are but incidentally mentioned, and the chief stress is 
laid upon duties and the motives which urge to their 
performance, Marshall points out how motives never 
can supply the strength we need : it is the power of 
Christ's life in us, it is Christ Himself, as we by faith 
are rooted in Him, who works all our works in us. 



NOTES, 351 

An abridgment of the work, for popular use, is pub- 
lished by Nisbet & Co. 



NOTE F. 

Note from Bengel on Rom. i. 4. 

^^According to the Spirit of Holiness. The word 
hagios, holy, when God is spoken of, not only denotes 
the blameless rectitude in action, but the very God- 
head, or to speak more properly, the divinity, or 
excellence of the Divine nature. Hence hagiosune 
(the word here used) has a kind of middle sense 
between hagiotes, holiness, and hagiasmos, sanctifica- 
tion. Comp. Heb, xii. 10 {hagiotes or holiness), v. 
14 {hagiasmos or sanctification) . So that there are, as 
it were, three degrees : sanctification, sanctity of life, 
holiness. Holiness is ascribed to the Father, the Son, 
and the Holy Ghost. And since here the Holy Spirit 
is not mentioned, but the spirit of holiness (prop, 
sanctity, hagiosune), we must further inquire what 
this remarkable expression denotes. The name spirit 
is expressly and very frequently given to the Holy 
Spirit ; but God is also called a spirit ; and the Lord 
Jesus Christ is called a spirit, but in contrast to the 
latter. 2 Cor. iii. 17. With this we must compare 
the fact that, as in this passage, so often the antithesis 
of flesh and spirit is found where Christ is spoken of 
1 Tim. iii. 16; 1 Pet. iii. 18. In these passages the 
Spirit is applied to whatever belongs to Christ (apart 
from the flesh, although this was pure and holy, and 
above the flesh), through His generation of the 
Father, who sanctified Him : in short, His Godhead 



352 NOTES. 

itself. For here, flesh and spirit, and chap. ix. 5, flesh 
and Godhead, stand in mutual contrast. This spirit 
is here called not the spirit of holiness, the usual title 
of the Holy Spirit ; but it is called in this passage the 
spirit of sanctity, to suggest at once the efficacy of 
that holiness or divinity, which led of necessity to the 
Saviour's resurrection, and by which it was most 
forcibly illustrated, and also that spiritual and holy, 
or Divine power of Jesus who has been glorified and 
yet retained a spiritual body. Before the resurrection 
the spirit was concealed under the flesh; after the 
resurrection the spirit of sanctity concealed the flesh. 
In reference to the former, He was wont to call Him- 
self the Son of man ; in reference to the latter, He is 
known as the Son of God.'' 

Beck, in his Lehrwissenschaft, p. 604, puts it very 
clearly, thus — 

^'Inasmuch as the innocence and purity of Christ 
were not present in His sufferings and death as a 
quiescent attribute, but were in fulb action in the 
indestructible life-power of the Spirit, as He sanctified 
His own self to God for us (''through the eternal 
spirit," Heh. ix. 14 — therefore, in Rotyi, i. 4, hagiosune, 
the habit of holiness in its action or sanctity, not 
hagiotes, only an inner attribute, or hagiasmos, holi- 
ness in its formation) — His suffering effected an ever- 
lasting redemption." 



N0TE8. 353 

' NOTE G. 

" Freed ** and '' Possessed "—The Twofold Result 
OF Redemption. 

(From an address by Pastor Stockmaiev,) 

"Who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem 
us from all iniquity, and purify unto Himself a people 
for His own possession, zealous of good works." 

"In the redemption work of our Saviour Jesus 
Christ, there are two definite parts. You will never 
find the secret of abiding in Christ, so long as you 
cannot see these two definite distinct parts. The first 
is "Jesus for me," the other "I for Jesus." Blessed 
be our Saviour that He came for sinners. He for us. 
Blessed be the Lord that there is redemption from 
penalty; but that is not yet all that redemption 
means. You must have a clear apprehension of the 
second part of redemption, by that same Holy Ghost 
who is the guide to introduce us into the full posses- 
sion of all that Christ, living and dying, has wrought 
out for us. He gave Himself that He might redeem 
us from all iniquity — not that we might have the 
pleasure of being pleased with our own purity or holi- 
ness, or such things ; but that He might have us 
altogether for Himself, to purify unto Himself, for 
Himself, not for Himself and themselves, but unto 
Himself a people of His own possession. 

"What is now redemption? — freedom from self, 
even spiritual self. We are not to be our own centre, 
the centre of our joy, our progress, having in our 
poor weak hands the threads of our spiritual life. 
There is no real spiritual life but Christ's life, and He 
must have the care of it altogether from the begin- 
23 



354 NOTES. 

ning to the end. Lifb up your eyes, dear brethren, you 
who were creeping on the ground. We are made for 
the glory of God, to be possessed by Jesus. The Lord 
God found a way, in giving His Son, the Lamb of 
God, His Lamb, to get such selfish people, who even 
in the line of the Christian hfe found means to seek 
and to nourish self, to get such people into His own 
real practical possession, to be possessed by Jesus. 
That is redemption, and that only ; that is liberty, and 
that is realty ; that is what satisfies, not to be satisfied 
with any experiences of your own, but to let go your 
experiences, and to say, I am free, so free as the 
people of Israel were coming out of Egypt, free to 
serve God. "Let my people go, that they may serve 
me.'' You are free, free through the blood of Christ, 
free through the power of the Holy Ghost — no flesh, 
no hand, no self being able to keep you back. The 
Lord has stretched out His arms upon all the powers 
who had kept us in the bondage of Egypt, and He 
triumphed over them. You are free as the bird of 
the air to live in Jesus — that is freedom ; you are free 
in your daily life, free in the deepest, inmost depths of 
your being, free for Jesus, possessed by Him, a people 
of His own possession. Let my people go, said God. 
So, I have given my blood, said Jesus ; and no flesh, 
no sin, no self can claim against the blood of Jesus. 
He has redeemed unto Himself, not for us, a people of 
His own possession. . . . 

" You are inquiring about the secret of abiding in 
Jesus. Have you not seen this in the 15th of John, 
that abiding and bearing fruit are inseparable ? You 
cannot abide in Jesus for His joy, and your inward 
satisfaction. The secret of abiding is to stand as a 
redeemed one, as firmly in the second part of redemp- 
tion as the first. I am now living for Jesus, and I 
have only to ask, Lord, what wilt Thou have done 



NOTES. 355 

now ? I am for Thee. I am for Jesus. I have only 
to follow, to follow as a sanctified one, as a possessed 
one, as one who is no more living for himself, who 
has given his life up into the hands of Jesus. Oh, 
how these questions of abiding become simple ! It is 
not mysticism ; it is not some special experience. It 
is simply a fact. I need Jesus for every moment, and 
my temptations as well as my duties become oppor- 
tunities of realizing this life of fellowship with Christ. 
Oh, yes, this is redemption ! Oh, mighty power of 
God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Ghost, 
engaged to keep such a weak, helpless, unfaithful 
thing as you and myself in the centre of life ! Sealed 
by the Holy Ghost, and God will never break His own 
seal." 



THE END, 



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